casual ultimate » briefcase

here is an overdose of cute to celebrate my birthday today. this is maxine and slider competing for total dominance of the water cooler at sectionals which is almost more than i can handle. i ran into maxine and her parents at fall league this weekend and man is she getting tall! she is undoubtedly going to be a pro basketball player so hopefully i can sign on as her manager if i get on board now.

public news team went 1-1 on saturday although its been a great season and the weather was near perfect so it took the sting out of our first game loss. plus mr. baker and miss casual got to play together for the first time all fall league season so that sweetened the deal too. baker we’ve missed you! we had 7 ladies but it was really nice and everyone got to play a lot somehow… now we just need to win both games next weekend to hopefully get a first round by at the tournament… unfortunately ill miss our games since they are in the afternoon and the headless horseman hunt will be happening at the same time. we got picked up in time out chicago thanks to m. ulty and every stop on the course is someplace haunted so its looking to be good times.

also this week ive discovered that there is an event horizon for me around wabansia and milwaukee and that if i get any further north than that i am sucked into the black hole of my couch never to come out. or at least not til the next day in most cases. this is worrysome as it isnt even cold out yet and the event horizon only expands as the temperature drops. anyway im officially a grown up today so im blaming that. seriously though… i did a series of dances in my kitchen when i received a bitchingly awesome coffee maker as a birthday gift. if that doesnt make me grown i dont know what does.

xoxo
miss casual

ms. ulty got back to her briefcase roots this weekend, spending a low-key saturday night at casa(pfil + zales (-pfil)) = casa zales and sunday afternoon at briefcase practice. here are a couple photos from practice on sunday. you know those picture matching games at bars? yeah. we’re going to submit these for the 2008 edition, coming to a peach pit near you. this is the new doctor, he likes this throw and ain’t too bad at it either. watch out for him, moe. i hope you got warmed up beating seiche this weekend - phew!

anyways, sat. night was spent with prof. berg and dube along with new briefcase peeps kim, dave and steve; liz and dp showed up later with jimmy johns in-hand. dp taught ms. ulty and liz how to play Wii while everyone else played quarters and then something along the lines of “ultimate penny,” where you have to get a penny into a can of beer; i’ve never measured the dimensions of a can’s opening, but is it big enough? after bowling we played boys vs. girls tennis doubles with steve. it took some practice, but the ladies were winning games by the time we called it quits. i’m glad it’s taken me this long to acquaint myself with wii, because it could easily become addictive. and, since dube was there, we retired to the roof for a couple rounds of beer pong; i believe dube and i beat kim and her friend, how did we do against the boys? i forgot. i know they staged a major comback, i feel like if they beat us it was by the last cup. we’ll get you next time. the roof also has quite the trailer park (was it white trash?) golf setup. basically their house is like adult daycare. dave even imposed his own naptime.

sunday practice was soooo fun for ms. ulty. i’d really been missing the sunday morning search for sunscreen and cleats and that bike ride down to uic. the team is looking good: old favorites from last year, plus a bunch of new ladies and gents including c.u. interns like carter, the new doctor and mom, a.k.a. allison (we’re so glad you’re back on the team!). all three of the volkfolk were there. maxine is days, nay, hours away from walking and is already being trained to throw leftie.

today is summer league and a sunny sunny roundtrip bike ride. ah summer ultimate, you make everything better.

sandblast weekend is drawing to a close. as i type this i am sitting in my living room with the bulk of team dego tea who took it to the finals today and then lost by 3 in a tight game against hurt locker. tyson and georgia’s team took home the title again this year but it was a good day of ultimate for the dego team regardless. the semi final against briefcase was an especially good game. it came down to two points between case and their former teammates and friends. we spotted the lovely maxine on the briefcase sideline and dr. welsh was in town holding it down with the other usual beach suspects.

dego had faced some serious competition from friends and family earlier in the day also. becky scored the game winning point in quarters going up against her own sister with her brother close by. if theres a more gifted family in ultimate we at casual ultimate have yet to see it. the pool play on saturday was a bit more easy going although it was a bit hotter and the water was closed because of ecoli so we almost melted. here’s chucktown pulling down the disc in spite of the heat.

in the final game dego tea was dropping players left and right due to sickness and injury. megin was tough as nails when her shoulder dislocated. kolb was all over the beach until he got sidelined by cramps. even chucktown hit a wall with the heat and had to come back chez casual / brizzle for an ice bath before our current viewing of anchorman. here are two of our chitown peeps who were uninjured - becky working it out on d and bjorn getting up in the air. chicago represent.

outside of the ultimate field… the town kids ate some burgers at kumas on friday night after putting down some dego tea chez casual with bjorn, jess cookie, foxy, brian, and goetz (who you might remember from spring break). dego tea is a concoction developed by bjorn and becky which consists of a special proportion of ice tea and lemoncello. danger. saturday at the fields we established our supremacy in the ‘most parented sideline’ category with the towns and the merce-dogs in attendance. we missed having bjorns mom and pops but theres always next year.

looks like ms. ultimate will be back in the chi-tizzle tomorrow night so well be getting back to bizness as usual around here. it was nice to hang with such a great group of west coasters and southerners this weekend on the dego sideline. hopefully well see them all again next year on the sand.

have you ever seen anything so pretty as a million skittle colored bikes like this? this is where miss casuals holiday weekend ended. well i guess technically it ended doing laundry and icing my ankle watching law $ order but really michelle and aaron’s super badass cupcake and bicycle filled bithday bbq was my last stop so well retell the weekend memento style and start at the end.

pulling up to the birthday bbq it was easy to pick out the house as it looked like a parade of pretty bicycles. michelle and aaron were great hosts and amy made some fierce vegan cupcakes. it was nice to drink some sangria and lounge with the ladies of c’n'd. we at casual ultimate feel very lucky to have met such wonderful ladies with such similar interests as ourselves. amy and miss casual are mentally preparing to race our first alleycat on saturday. we need to think positive. theres no ‘i’ in win. but before then there will surely be some tricks as miss casuals skids need work and ms. ulty wants to perfect her skid hop move.

previously the cu staff and stacy had stopped by a bqq thrown by dp and liz. looks like hales is back in town for good and is our new neighbor. baby audrey came looking like she meant business and the boss’s neice was the envy of miss casual in ruffly pink socks and perfectly fluffy hair. with all the babies around it occurred to us that briefcase could easily be renamed ‘team earmuffs.’ good to see the letter j out and about and again we were glad to have friends that appreciate grilling and beer the way team paulina does.

all the bbqs came after recovery brunch because stacy, brooke, and the cu staff started at piece the night before with malt liquor and determination. crunk or die. miss casual had bumped into nat on armitage and he let on the it was going down at dannys so off we went. stacy bought us a shot and it was ON. super dance party all night til stacy looked like she might be napping at the bar. we havent danced so much since… well since the last time we were at dannys probably. a stranger had given stacy and ms. ulty ballons on the walk over from piece so we tied them above our table to indicate clearly ‘this is where the party’s at.’ balloon time.

ms. ultimates bday needs its own explanation from the birthday girl. she also is in further photographic evidence so ill leave it to her. back to the architectures. lates.

ms. ultimate: phew, i’m exhausted. what did you think of today’s games?

miss casual: well, i got mauled by a cougar, i didn’t learn anything about ultimate, and i ruined my crystal gale shirt. how do you feel?

ms. ultimate: like committing harey carey.

miss casual: take me out to the ballgame?

ms. ultimate: no, like the samurai suicide ritual.

that pretty much sums up saturday’s performance on the field. we’re not sure how it happened because our team is actually stacked full of ballers, but there it is. it might have been a result of ms. ulty’s boxstep and miss casual’s broken fingernails. a bit frustrating. needless to say other performed like a squeaky bionic man; tun came out of nowhere to handle like a maniac; we found out matt is on our team; mel was everywhere; and we caught just a fleeting glimpse of roadhouse, thanks to the end of tax season. baby you know we call you that because you love it. it turned out that joe was a good trade, 85% because of the hat he was wearing.

it all started off so positively, with dp, liz and the c.u. staff carpooling to save the planet and fueling up on victory twizzlers. they soon turned to bile in our stomachs.

we had given up the weekend as a lost cause, but then rob called ms. ulty to say that he and the benders would be in the city in an hour. she was on the couch in her PJs in the dark when the call came, but against all odds she rallied. miss casual was long gone. luckily mini, doobs and rob brought fun back to town, and we went to annette’s party in logan square. it’s a little known fact that playing shoulders with the rodells is the best way to de-lame oneself. it was all fun and games until ms. ulty got voted off the table in survivor cups. one northside and an underdog later, she had recovered.

sunday brought sun, taxes and potstickers. lookout for mayhem as that guy rob is abandoning us for milwaukee next weekend. this week may be dangerous.

last night the cu staff dropped in on some of our favorite people, the original briefcase baby and her lovely parents. that makes two weeks in a row that weve shown up uninvited on a monday night on someone’s doorstep for a housecall. look out. our next monday night housecall could be you. heres a photo of the clocktower at the end of the block in printer’s row that made us feel like we were having a dickens moment.

over onion rings and pinot nior we discussed childrens books, ms. ulty’s new profession as a nanny, and just add water family planning. maxine is almost too much for us to handle. she’s so cute we couldn’t take out eyes off of her until she called it a night. we all agreed that we are eagerly anticipating dr. welsh’s return to the midwest in a few short weeks and that stuffed cheeseburgers are what life is really about (if the bacon and cheddar are inside, they don’t make the rest of the condiments slip around on the bun). allison turned maternal and gave us advice on how to keep boys in line, and we saw her strategy in action: ‘nate, you’re putting music on, right? nate, are you opening a bottle of wine?’ usually you have to pay someone for insightful observations like this but we get it for cheap. thats where the post title comes from. nate admitted that sometimes he just lets allison drive. are we in the trust tree?

the house, the baby, the parents are all warm and lovely. what a great stop. we’ve had two great monday nights in a row and who knows where we’ll end up next week? you might wanna be home with some hot chocolate on the stove in case its your house.

xo
c and u

oh, notre dame. so you know when you don’t really want to go out but your friends drag you to a party and proceed to get completely wasted while you sulk in a corner, sober, because you agreed to be the DD and/or have to wake up and be at your grandma’s house at 8 am the next day, and what should be an awesome party becomes sickening and you think to yourself, am i like this when i’m drunk? that is how i felt at work today reading dube’s description of the party weekend in south bend, also known as part a. you threw up in a pitcher and then boots spilled it? you sealed your eyes shut with wax? you made fergilicious your ringtone?!?! keep it together people! anyway, thanks to dubes for the info and to roadhouse for the pics. i am totally down for part b in double oh seven.
—————————————

Friday: Work stunk it took all day. At lunch time i discovered that most people were bailing out on friday night, actually everyone bailed on friday night except Ryan. So I get home after a tiresome day at work and drink a beer while figuring out my plans for the evening. My friend Leia comes over and we play on youtube looking up music videos to sweet songs such as money maker (which is coincidently now my backring tone) and fergilicious. Ryan arrives bringing with him beer (always a plus). Mini gets his butt over to my house also bringing beer, however the beer he brought was like no other I have ever seen. It’s name is Cooks. it has a genuine beer flavor and promotes saving the world. No alcoholic percentage could be found anywhere, but there was a surgeon general’s warning that pregnant women should not drink alcholoic beverages, we assumed this to mean that it was in fact alcoholic.

After a couple beers we went over to Mini’s house to play Wii and then drinking games. After a rocky start that included pounding a couple Cooks, I began to dominate, despite what Ryan may or may not say. after that we went to an engineering grad school party (mini is still in grad school and i have my degree in engineering, so we felt we were justified in attending the party). It wasn’t quite as exciting as we had hoped, so Ryan and I decide we’re going to clear off a table to play drinking games. on this table are several candle, you know the floaty liquid kind. Thinking it would be safer to blow them out rather than move them lite, i attempt to blwo them out, but instead blow wax all over my face. yes, total embarrassment. Wax even sealed my eyes shut because it got caught in my eyelashes. Ryan led me to the bathroom and helped me remove most of the wax. fortunately i was still drunk and the embarrassment didn’t seem so great. After that we went back to Mini’s and devoured some pizza we ordered from papa johns, hoffman met us there too and i started to fall asleep and then we went home to rest up for the next day.

Saturday: I wokeup around 8am with a huge head ache, i popped some pills, drank some tea and stayed in the fetal position in mybed till about 9 when i got antsy and waited for everyone else to wakeup to go to breakfast. Finally Ryan and mini and our friend Alan got up and we went to Studebagels, a lovely little breakfast place in south bend. a little later after georgia and rob arrived we went disc golfing on campus while also giving a mini tour (read as me mostly talking about buildings while everyone else ignored me).

Then we got a call from Niki saying that she and steve and her friends jello and shot arrived. We went back to my house to meet them. upon entry into the house i discovered that the tv was on. Now this might seem like a strange observation, but my roommates (butler and Kreece) and I were under the impression that we didn’t receive tv. Steve rodell made an antenna out of tin foil and got us a signal. Shocking none the less. Promptly following this discovery, i realized i had lost my wallet while disc golfing. so i head back to campus with everyone in tow (cause niki and steve had yet to walk around yet) and look for my wallet. Shortly after parking i received a phone call from my dad asking me if i had lost my wallet. apparently someone found it and called him, amazing. i met up with the guy and he gave it back. I am very lucky. anyway after that we went to mini;s and played some more Wii. lots of fun. Dan benjamen and tom carter showed up at that time.

then we all went out to dinner. at the very end of dinner pfil and shultz showed up wearing “hick” clothes, aka tight ass jeans and overalls and flannel shirts. They then gave me my christmas present: a lynyrd skynyrd shirt, a leopard print thong, and bachelorette dice. After dinner we went back to my house for fun and games and dancing. Jello and shot got around very quickly. The first big game that was played was flip cup. Tall people versus the shorties. It was hilarious. The shorties dominated until the tallies started cheating. Then shultz i believe, decided we should wager on the game. if the shorties won, the tallies would all drop their pants (there were no women on the tall team). If the tallies won I had to wear the outfit shultz and pfil brought me. I did not like this idea, but my team agreed for me. It wa sa hardofught battle, considering the tall team kept cheating, but in th end we lost and i had to wear the stupid outfit. It was pretty funny though.

The next game we palyed was survivor shoulders (see the pictures of people huddled together those would be the groups we basically divided into as such happens on survivor). With a botch on both my part and even more so Boozewench’s our sect lost and we were all voted off. Niki was eventually named the winner, even though she had been voted off. She played like a true champ, it was awesome. After that it was a lot of table dancing and boozing and other games. but mostly dancing from what i remember. Also during the shoulders game you ahd to take a shot if you botched, pfil and shultz took a ton of shots, whether they were deserved or not i dunno, but they drank a ton. Around midnight, i got sleepy, as tends to happen, and because my bed is on the first floor of my house i pretty much passed out in my bed with butler and leslie (roommate and friend–dont’ worry nothing scandalous happened).

Basically from what everyone told me the next day this is what happened later that night in a nutshell: they all went to pyster bar in downtown south bend. pfil spent the majority of the night leaning up against the wall and puking into pitchers, which boozewench some how managed to knock over. schultz was being ridiculous, and kept trying to get hoffman and jen (hoff’s gf) to go in on a three way kiss with him. schultz and pfil were hitting on niki. niki was trying to make sure pfil wasn’t dying. steve dropped to glasses and realized he might be a little drunk. ryan and boozewench just kept making out. mini enjoyed everyhting going on. candace was crazy as usual, and cheng took it all in. somehow they all made it to hoff’s alive.

Sunday: Schultz, pfil, candace and cheng all left before i got to see them in the morning. Georgia puked when niki and ryan were recapping the rest of the night to me. those of us remaining went to studebagels for breakfast. then we went to mini’s to watch the bears game on tv. everyone left after the game, thus ending the weekend.

i believe this is most of it. I’m sure i’ve left some stuff out and i apologize for that. there were several drunk dials etc that most of us don’t remember. I didn’t take any pictures, the only one who did was cheng, and i think she sent out all the ones she took. as i read back over this email, it really has nothing to do with briefacase at all, but i like to write chronologically as it happened to me.

They say a picture is worth 1000 words; here’s a 7000 word essay about halloween in florida, chicago-style. there was a lot of sorrow to drown, which may explain why so many people got pushed into the pool (akira, seriously, sorry about your phone).

* casual *

ms. ultimate had to take a power nap at the grownups’ house before facing the madness at osprey. she walked in to find the same crowd around the coffee table, still playing shoulders, but there were about more 40 empty beer cans than there than when she’d left. after a couple more rounds and clarification that boots is only nineteen, the halloween kids showed up. props to machine for taking the holiday seriously. it warms a c.u. girl’s heart to see the italian bicyclist and our secretary of legislation dressed in children’s shake n’ bake costumes. we somehow failed to do a costume competition, but my vote would have to go to our fave viking, dressed as superman, or the sweetest witch in the west. cho got pretty scary later on, though. i’d give schultzie a nomination for wearing a speedo all night, but unfortunately that was no costume.

you’d have to talk to one of the attendees to get the real scoop, but some of the mentionable highlights include a never-ending game of nemesis flippy cup that wasn’t as much of a show as some of the fans were hoping for; lots of sausage in the hot tub, pictured here; items including chairs, people and nationals player pack schwag getting thrown in the pool and, according to one guest, “a lot of ass slapping by a lot of people. yeah, that’s the truth.”

much to her dismay, Ms. Ulty missed the upstairs ass competition, but apparently the fighting was fierce. According to our correspondent in the field, the challenges and results were as follows (judges were the couch sitters, win by slap):

- BG vs. Schultzie, best shelf ass: schultzie
- BG vs. meagles, most desirable ass: meagles
- Meagles vs. beef, best ass: beef
- meagles vs. val, best ass w/ dance competition: meagles, on showmanship
- Bonus push-up competition, BG vs. schultzie, BG with a 30 push-up handicap: BG

i think the moral of the story is that BG needs to stick with push-ups, schultzie should keep up the lunges and plyos, and c.u. wants meagles to teach us her moves. solid party, people, we need to do it again soon.

play casual. stay ultimate.

Due to the number and magnitude of events, this is going to have to be a post in two parts.

* ULTIMATE *

If you really wanted the play by play you’d have read it on the UPA’s championship site by now, so I’ll give a quick overview. Briefcase was glad to establish regional dominance (asterix) by beating Moe on Thursday, and of course it was fun to play Chucktown’s new team. I think their name is copper orangutan, i’m not sure, we called them Chuck’s Team. Deliverance brought the pain and the dueling banjos. Luckily mr. town was close at hand with his fiddle to defend our honor. After a relatively quiet night at the condos, we won a couple outside the region by beating hooray! and bad larry. We had to add a period after Mr. Briefcase. on the scoreboard to even the punctuational tables before playing Hooray!. Bad Larry was a fun, fun game, with some our lady alums on the other team to liven things up. We were psyched to go into the quarters play-in game that afternoon against Amp….unfortunately we lost. The wind picked up but our energy level didn’t; surprising the donuts Lauren brought to the breakroom didn’t do the job. Intense game, case.

Friday night put a starving Briefcase squad huddled around the bar at Daquiri Deck, thanks to the masters team that stole our table. Apparently they serve the blue plate special under an 8 o’clock reservation for “mr. briefcase.” We showed them who’s boss by playing flippy cup while waiting for the main course; keep it classy, chicago. And of course the osprey house drowned its pre-quarters sorrows in the pool and hot tub. Curry ref’d volleyball until everyone realized the that it was folly to challenge a team with Ness on it. Steve-o, remember when you whiffed that jump shot off the steps? Best play of the weekend.

A sleepy and ambivalent Briefcase awoke Saturday morning to find themselves pitted against an NYC team stacked with two 2005 BC interns. I wish we had beaten their asses, if only to punish them for going to work for the competition. We kind of got back at them by forcing one of their handlers to huck a disc into a bystander’s face - his girlfriend’s - at point-blank range. I’m sure she took the vacation days and made the trip all the way down to Florida for that. Our next game vs. Montana….well, Lainers brought us cookies. Here we are in the picture that’s going on the xmas card this year. Thanks for making the trip, quaddie!

We watched some fantastic finals games in the sun with our other Chicago friends on Sunday. Dubes won the spirit award for Briefcase, and Akira won by Machine - who won for Nemesis? Send us a picture of you in yourr fuzzy 5 ultimate hat.

All in all, the ultimate was hott and so was the team. It was a sad plane ride home. Ms. ulty and miss casual had so much fun formatting your TPS reports this year. This team went through a major overhaul in Q2’06, in both the roster and style of practice and play. The results would suggest our execs delivered for the shareholders. Thanks to everyone for a fantastic season - I can’t wait for next year! I think we’re going to come back better than ever.

play ultimate. stay casual.

thanks to our war room phone (its red) that connects miss casual at home base directly to mr briefcase we have some information from pool play at nationals.

briefcase lost two yesterday, one to their former colleague chucktown and his team brass monkey, but made it into a quarters play-in game with AMP this afternoon. unfortunately they lost but they had a good day overall, beating bad larry and flaming moe.

according to bk, our correspondant in the field, machine was in a similar position to briefcase, upsetting condors early but losing their play-in game to ring 12-15.

nemesis is in a similar position playing for placement tomorrow after losing a tight game to slowdown out of texas.

brass monkey won all their games and are headed to quarters in the morning along with becky and her ladies on backhoe.

well try and keep you posted as the weekend moves along and look for a big ol post monday from ms. ulty herself.

thanks to our new friend bil at ultimatephotography@gmail.com for the photos. we owe you some good old fashioned chitown hospitality (read: pbr) if you ever make it over this way.

any good birthday lasts a whole month and in the interest of continuing the revelry last night miss casual went out for another in a series of birthday dinners to celebrate with her chitown peoples. marya and the birthday girl did a little networking at parlor before heading to club lucky to meet c(b)r and tbrizzle, our casual brothers from another mother. tbr didnt have to teach last night becuase of this fire at left. with forces of nature aligning to get everyone together the night was sure to be a success.

tbr also brought the birthday girl a barbie tiara which she wore faithfully throughout dinner. it made it easy for ms. ulty to find us when she rolled up on her way home from a trip for work. it was nice to see everyone and catch up before the exodus to sarasota happens this evening. the fans are waiting on pins and needles to see what happens when brass monkey and mr. briefcase go head to head tomorrow. will chucktown be playing? will anyone be able to stop him if he is? will mama town bring her accordion to the field? will briefcase come up with a cheer befitting one of their former colleagues? who will come out on top? stay tuned. good luck to all our people headed to florida. reprazent for the chi-tizzle.

If you know anyone who has to fly out of Chicago to southern Florida on the evening of the 25th, you should call right now and tell them to book tickets, because all flights are about to be overtaken by hot ultimate players. Unless….are there enough to make a chartered plane worthwhile?

Chicago rocked Regionals this weekend, with Nemesis coming in first in the women’s division, Briefcase coming in second in mixed and Machine taking the third bid for the gents; Real Huck, the Masters team, won their game to go. From Saturday morning domination in bracket play to the last catch of the day landing in Ferrari’s hands in the Machine endzone, Chi-town/the‘ville represented for our visitors.

As far as final standings, Nemesis beat Bait to clinch the championship. Mojo came in second. Briefcase played an intense but high-spirited game with with Flaming Moe for second place, owing to the fact that both teams were guaranteed bids and were playing for seed. CLX won the mixed division, but turned down the bid due to the fact that they’ll be representing Midwest ultimate to the world and throwing some shrimp on the barby in Australia later this fall; thus, Briefcase ends up the #1 seed coming out of the region. Carleton alums, aka ¡Salsa Police!, finished fourth and got bumped up to take the third bid. Machine beat Madison for their bid. Sub Zero took first in the open division, and Big Ass Truck took second. Real Huck beat Chico’s Bail Bonds in the game to go; Twin Cities’Surly came in first.

It was perfect out for ultimate, not windy but just enough to keep things interesting, and the bluest skies for this weekend in recent memory. Briefcase will be seeing several 2005 season alums down in Florida: Brass Monkey won the Northwest, and we’re hoping Chuck will be in playing form by the end of the month. Justin and Carrie qualified with Puppet Regime, which came in second to Slow White in the Northeast. And, of course, Sals with Nemesis.

So, does anyone know what other co-ed teams might be skipping Nationals for Worlds? And does this mean that rightful 2006 mixed division title will be won down under rather than just down south? Rumor had it that Bad Larry would be foregoing their Nationals bid too, but they’re listed among the 16 on the Championship site.

Don’t put the sunglasses away for the summer, because you’re going to need them in a few weeks.

Early in the afternoon last Monday, September 25, A. V. reportedly gave birth to a baby girl, Maxine. While the V’s are supposedly happy, healthy and at home, neither A not the baby has made a public appearance since the Sectionals tournament, just one days before the “birth.” A’s new secluded lifestyle and the lack of any baby pictures or eyewitnesses has led some to question the baby’s existence. C.U. has obtained these satellite images of baby Maxine, although picturologists are not able to positively identify the images as a human child.

The birth was without complication and drug-free. It has been alleged that the V’s decision to choose this method may have been spiritual. While this was apparently not a “silent” birth, it should be noted that the Church of Scientology does in fact ban the use of pain relief drugs during childbirth. A. has stated that “Maxine” is a family name, but others have noted that the baby may be named after the quirky principle character in the 1999 film Being John Malkovich, or that the name may be a derivation of the French men’s name Maximillen, meaning “the greatest.” Disgruntled teammates have suggested the name may be a reference to A and N’s combined ultimate skills, and their hope that young Maxine will indeed be the greatest player ever to grace the sport.

A typically joins N at Briefcase practice, cheering from the sideline - this past Sunday she was nowhere to be seen, although Nate insisted she was at home resting. A source close to the V’s told C.U. reporters, “she loves going to Briefcase practice and sitting on the pregnant line, and normally clears her schedule to make time. I’m really surprised that she’s not out here with N and the rest of the team.”
Several days before the noted absence at practice, N had sent an email to the team informing them of Maxine’s arrival. It was a terse, text-only document and N declined to provide pictures upon request. First the email, then A’s curious absence from the sidelines, have made friends of the V’s wonder whether the birth took place at all.

When I think about it, A’s stomach kept getting bigger and bigger but she didn’t gain weight anywhere else,” said a former teammate who asked that her identity not be revealed. “She look great. And she ate an astounding amount but, you know, that’s what the V’s do. It’s strange that it was pasta salad instead of ham sandwiches, though.”

“A has been in a great mood for the last nine months, and I’ve heard that pregnant women can get cranky sometimes,” said a regular fan of the V’s style of play. “I guess it’s possible that she just got a huge beer belly not playing ultimate. It happens.”

When asked about A’s extended absence from the ultimate scene, friends and teammates say they miss her and want to see the baby. Many have also offered the fact that, while A certainly appeared to be great with child and N was seen doting on her even more than usual, no one ever actually saw her stomach.

“She would wear N’s jersey, because it was bigger, and was definitely rocking the stretchy pants,” one beach player said. “But, no - come to think of it I never actually saw the stomach. She let me feel the baby kick once but, to be honest, I didn’t feel anything. And her stomach felt exactly like a gel bike seat.”

Only one acquaintance of the V’s, tbrizzle, has come forth and said that he has seen baby Maxine. Tbrizzle allegedly visited A in the hospital just days after the birth. When asked to provide evidence of the Maxine sighting, however, tbrizzle failed to produce anything substantial.

“I saw the baby in the hospital,” said tbrizzle. “She is the cutest baby in the world!!! It’s no surprise with such fantastic parents, but this baby is amazing - amazing, I’m telling you!! And she got A’s hair, which is a plus. She actually has an amazing amount of hair for a newborn baby.”

Friends and teammates continue to wonder, will they ever see baby Maxine? Will a picture of the little cutie-pie be brought to Regionals and passed around? Can the baby paparazzi satisfy the needs of the demanding Chicago ultimate public? How long will A “resting at home,” as N insists she has been doing for over one full week? Will Maxine herself show up at Regionals this weekend, and will she be wearing a tie? The world will wait and watch.

last night was pretty casual. so much so that the old joke ‘what comes before part B? part-ay’ was lost on one member of our group before we even left the house (try and guess who it was). hollering ‘what comes after b’ didnt quite get the rousing response intended but we did indeed get off the couch at the BR’s and make it up to quenchers in honor of mini’s birthday. here is his illegally aquired license showing him looking older and wiser.

we started out at the BR’s with the briefcase peeps watching pointy soccer upstairs and the c.u. staff watching the muppet movie with the pretty ladies downstairs. the boys had to take shots every time their opponants team scored so before we got to the bar they had each had 5-6 shots and a few beers including tbr. drunk tony is rivaling drunk cho at this point for most fun when intoxicated. the leprachauns beat the spartacuses and we left for quenchers. drunk tony took a piece of chicken for the road and he ended up giving up on it and shoving it down ms. ultimate’s shirt. the chicken fight was on.

at quenchers we met up with baker and our new friend tom carter who was wondering what the fragrance of casual ultimate was (’sugar and spice and everything nice of course’). we had to leave boots and ryan at home since theyre certified minors but everyone else held it down in honor of mini. we traded hats and there were more shots and then miss casual busted out to walk drunk tony and the birthday boy home and finish off the ice cream. heres hoping mr. briefcase and haymaker are not suffering this morning because of our late night. rob was worried about making it home to get more clothes for today but georgia graciously offered to loan him shorts (’freak, youll fit in my shorts!). and on that note i will take my leave of you. happy monday.

xoxo
miss casual

the weekend started off without a bang after all. with the promise of lowering a couch via a complicated cable and pulley system from the roof to the fourth floor deck of pfil’s new place, c.u. was certain that we would get some photos worthy of ‘faces of death: furniture edition.’ but no dice. in bjorn, tbrizzle, and paul’s capable hands the couch drop went surprisingly smoothy. miss casual took to the street with lauren to watch the couch go over the side. with a 40 oz. in one hand and a camera in the other i watched with the stunned car wash guys as the couch landed safely in the hands of dp and pfil on the deck.

of course saturday was the start of tuneup and ms. ulty can post a bit about their first day out since miss casual was holding it down with rick, bk, and liz on the funnest fall league team ever. we played savage since everyone was at the tournament / weddings / notre dame game but we played pretty well considering and yelled and giggled quite a bit which bodes well for the rest of the season. seriously…think of somebody fun who’s playing fall league. theyre on our team. (c.u. in no way wishes to offend our future opponants…unless it makes you more scared of us and in some way furthers our quest for victory). saturday night it was notre dame mayhem at the BR’s with all the south benders and Dan Baker even. here’s Baker wrestling with Mike D. sunday on the briefcase sideline. we missed you dan. were glad youre back.

the post title comes from carlo’s new haircut for the tourny which makes him an honorary new kid on the block. check out the photo below. you be the judge. sunday on the way to watch our business casual brothers and sisters rock their way to the finals, bk, rick and miss casual cast the entire casual ultimate movie. we are still taking suggestions for a few roles but generally here is the cast.

parker posey is miss casual
portia de rossi is ms. ultimate
will ferrell is dan baker
tom cruise is mike d.
the wilson brothers are the br’s (we think)
will arnett might be pfil
jet li is cho
chuck norris is bjorn
buster from arrested is joe little
jack black is russell
jeneane garofolo is sally
obviously whats his face from the o.c. is ferrari
i think vince vaughn could cameo as dr. mercer
maybe sarah silverman as becky? or lindsey lohan?
chuck is the only person cahrasmatic enough to play himself
so we have some obvious gaps to fill here…(akira, bk, thor and liz, dr. welsh etc.) so post suggestions or substitutions. *inspired casting will get you a v.i.p. pass to the launch party.*

coming soon to a theater near you…

here are some more photos from the tourny thanks to candice. (more coming later due to technical difficulties…)

the real winner this weekend was the city of madison. every time i go there it gets harder to leave…i think they put something in the water. but seriously…madison is awesome. briefcase didnt have the most stellar weekend on the field but it was still a great weekend in c.u. history.

drama on half-day road
we didnt get out of town on time becuase ms. utlimate works for an environmental fascist. just a note…half days do not start at 430. so the br’s and the c.u. staff plus slider rolled out of town at rush hour dispite our best intentions and began our long trek to madison. eventually we made it into town to get dinner. madison has the cows on parade which brought up a list of dictator cow names - moomar cowdafi, moosolini, chairman moo… the list goes on and on. we met a member of the team that they had picked up last minute on the street by coincidence while ms. ultimate was vaulting over construction cones on the sidewalk.

briefcase goes to injury town
then we got some sleep at georgia’s and headed out to the fields. the briefcase squad was slim to begin with and people were dropping like flies. leah got stepped on. rob (here looking like some kind of crazy office stripper with his briefcase tie and no shirt) busted his knee laying out. tony got horrible leg cramps and the winner of the grossest injury goes to ryan with his softball sized ankle. it was a slightly depressing day but there were moments of magic like leah’s sick nasty lady hammers, georgia’s big sky, and this layout from tony who had a birthday, along with slider, on saturday. to celebrate, it was birthday cake and high life at the fields. tony and carlo along with yours truly and steve came up with a new product for miller - low life beer. low carbs, low calorie, low price beer. if high life is the champagne of beer, steve figured low life would be the boones farm of beer. we would volunteer to be the spokespeople with our brown bag stylo.

just call her ‘boots’
saturday night we went to the ultimates’ compound and the ’70’s porn house’ as ms. ultimate calls it, was amazing. there was lots of steak and many drinking games which lead to the inevitable booting by not only our favorite 19 year old, but slider too. rob and georgia arm wrestled over a card game and there was a threat of a drinking game where we would have to drink everytime one of the c.u. staff said the word ‘blog’. dangerous….sunday morning it rained and then poured and briefcase, with no healthy men except the indistructable steve philips, slept in and bailed on the tourny. we had a rock and roll party instead. ms. ulty and steve went for a hike looking like swedish refugees and the rest of us stayed in and put together a puzzle and played euchre while listening to whitesnake. rock and frickin roll.

drama on kick a boo road
on our way back to the chi there was some drama when the water cooler flew out of the truck into the highway median. carlo came to the rescue and then it was off to madison for food. we stopped at a crazy irish pub where we got to sit at a square table on couches and hear irish folk stories from curry while eating lounge fries. full and happy, it was off to the WP to go see talladega nights with the real world house and monica. it was a great weekend and hopefully well get some photos / commentary from bjorn and/or bryan of cho’s victory in the real world triathalon on saturday to complement this mass of photos from madison.

xoxo
miss casual and ms. ultimate

well c.u. is hitting the road for madison this weekend. the staff is piling into tony’s truck with both (b)r’s and slider and heading for the hills. briefcase is playing a tournament and miss casual is doing her nails in a briefcase french manicure in preparation for the main event. a little good old fashioned family bonding is just what c.u. needs.

last night we went out to celebrate bk’s final day at the forbidden fruit fortress which kept me out way past my beadtime and way out of my zip code. at least bjorn and tony brought fudgcicles to make the drive up there more fun. bjorn, i expect you and bryan king to cover the trathalon in my absence. its a tough job but somebody’s gotta do it. since you are the second deadliest man we know you should be able to handle it no problem.

also in the way of upcoming c.u. events, thursday is official ’skip work and go to six flags and get on some mf’in waterslides’ day so get ready… ‘no boss i was just working on this rendering. no im almost done. ill be right there. *cough cough*’

all the terrycloth is packed into our matching louis vuitton trunk cases and the cocktails are shaken into their appropriate nalgenes for the trip so have a casual weekend and well see you kids same time and place on monday with updates from the ‘joe and cho rumble in the jungle’ throwdown and briefcase’s ‘ass kicking madison good times’ weekend.

(possible discussion topics - best cocktail to put in a nalgene? best songs to sing along to in the car?)

xoxo
c..u.

sorry for the late post but it took me all day yesterday to recover from sandblast…and i didnt even play. and by ‘recover’ i mean ‘eat an absurdly large brunch with the towns and sarah and jason t. and hit the movies with bk’. it was so great to have chuck and sarah in town this weekend. here’s a picture of chuck about to go to work on saturday.

and work they did. briefcase played a sick nasty tournament this weekend with our own ms. ultimate having one of her best tournaments ever (this is a third party opinion from numerous sources). unfortunately she wasnt around for sandburst saturday night becuase she was watching a mariachi band at her parents house. sandburst was awesome. we ate at el cid (heres a pic at right with chuck in his work you dog shirt and sarah throwing us some blue steel) and then chilled at the BR’s with beer and mini kit kat bars. no wonder i love those guys… the talk turned to soccer, moisturizer, and how miss casual needs to marry a mob boss. i already have the pointy toed italian leather heels and big gold hoops so if anybody knows a soprano, hook me up.

akira and cho didnt make it because they were bringing the pain to the official sandblast party. through a C.U. correspondant we got reports of them stumbling home late and not being able to open their front door with either of their keys. (we are working on getting a photo of the offending lock to inspect it’s obviously defective nature.) then cho proceeded to shoot said correspondant using his finger as an imaginary gun. gangsta.

so unfortunately be’ach got upset in the quarters on sunday, possibly because of their a-game tactics at cherry red the night before and briefcase had to watch / play against the speedo team. ick. however we did get the C.U. MHP (most hilarious player) out of that game. Jarrett shaved his number into his back hair and so goes down in history… (does anyone have a pic of this?)

bjorn, who was off filming a doublemint gum ad on saturday night, brought his a-game on sunday where he and becky and their madison team bested briefcase in the finals. it was sad to see briefcase lose but it was nice to have some casual peeps on the winning team. so big ups to bjorn and becky and the volkmans whose divine dinner sunday night made losing a little easier to take.