casual ultimate » west coast

It’s all good, other writers. I’ll cover the entire month of May with this post. By the way, it’s no fun writing posts when you don’t have a job. Job = wanting to write posts. I guess I’ll check in though.

I must admit that I just don’t get tired of the disc out here. It is SOOOO good. Even the winter leagues out here are killer. There are 20 teams or something, and every single one of them has a roster that makes me think they are going to win…except mine, and we made quarters, so what’s up now? You want some? Get in line, son.

I just finished 14 months of try-outs. I say that because I think that in order to make a men’s team out here, you need to try-out with them at least twice. Oh yeah, or just be one of those guys who makes it their first time out. (I would recommend this approach by the way.) The point is, you not only have to be good enough, you have to PLAY good enough, you have to have what the team needs, and in my experience, you have to come back next year. When I moved out here, I was arguably a worse player than I am now, but I remember pretty much catching everything that was thrown to me and winning all the discs in the air for awhile during try-outs, and the fact is, if you are an unknown, that’s probably not good enough.

Anyway, I will find out this week if I am on Revolver. I like this team a great deal. I like the captains. I like the heart. I like the way these guys bring each other up. There’s so little ego directed inward at team-mates, that it makes it a real pleasure to go out and make plays. This is the first men’s team I’ve been around like that, particularly in the elite category. They’ve done a good job of getting some guys out with height and toughness this year. Depending on who they take, they could put out some pretty big lines for the first time and develop a more dynamic deep game. Oh yeah, and by the way, they can still break the mark and take 100% shots until the cows come home. Not a bad combo. Kinda like the #4 at Wendy’s.

What else is new? I am not working. My band is playing a good amount and close to cutting an album. We are The Wayside State, and we’re on Myspace. www.myspace.com/thewaysidestate

I have a beautiful girlfriend, and my sister is getting married. Give him the stick; don’t give him the stick!!! I watched the fensler gi joe PSA’s again yesterday for the first time in a couple of years. My god, what a comedy goldmine.

It was nice seeing a bunch of you last month in Chicago. No Sandblast or Poultry for me this year. Over the past year, I aged 5 and realized that sitting around and getting enough sleep - and not vomiting in 90 degree heat until I almost lost consciousness - is nice.

Luego

Some people do “strength training” to “build up a base” for “the next season” of “extreme Ultimate flippy-disc”. I, on the other hand, have been keeping busy….I joined a new gym….that’s just one thing.

I had a physical assessment when I joined the gym, and the lady took me around the gym to see what I could do. Number of times I’ve been on the bench since college: 20 times in 4 years or so. We put on plates and gave it a go. 10, no problem except that it wasn’t that easy. We added some 35’s. One….two…thrrr….yup. Two. We took off the 35’s and added 10’s and 5’s or something like that. One…two…three..four…fffff…yup. Four. Nice job, big guy.

So with my “One Degrees 2008: Year of the Sideboob” body condition, I think it’s safe to say that I can bench about 1/2 of my body weight or another way to think about it, which I think is the metric system (not sure what the metric system actually is): I can bench at least the amount of food that I eat in a week if you could somehow turn it into a bar that I could lift while lying on my back.

Another thought about this exercise: you really should be sitting up if you want to digest your lunch properly, so I would say don’t eat RIGHT BEFORE YOU WORKOUT. That’s a late breaking fitness story from the West Coast. You heard it here first on casualobesity.fat.

Next, they did a body-fat test to see what percentage of my body is actually undigested milkshakes. It’s 27% with an 8% margin of error. My confidence level is high that I am above the “suggested level for a guy your age” of “ideally 10% but no more than 15%”. C’mon. Really? What year is it? 2000 BC? Am I (a) hunting for my food every day or (b) talking to some former D1 soccer player who did both her knees and is now a trainer in the Financial District of a major city in the fattest nation in the world? Darken in the oval by the letter B on your scorecard completely.

I found somebody with 10% body fat in my journeys, and I found another person with a body-type similar to mine as well. They are both small and fit on your lap. Here they are side-by-side.

Kindest Regards,

Chucktown: Population Fat

I’ve gotta say. It’s really not that bad. There’s pretty much no one here. I’m wearing jeans. I’m listening to music. I’ve already masturbated twice. Ok, that last one’s not true. Still though, not bad.

I started listening to Pandora.com on a friend’s recommendation and I’m kinda digging it. It’s streaming music that is similar to Thievery Corporation right now. I just typed in Theivery Corporation, and it makes rocket go. Also not bad.

I’m dating this exquisite creature that the earthlings call “Tracy.” She is like a cross between seafoam icing and freedom. Not bad.

I guess the work that I’m supposed to be doing should be taking priority right now, but I can’t say that I’m too fired up to get it done. I’m happy to say that I’m not too opposed to getting it done either though. Man, peanut butter sounds good right now. Does that mean that I’m pregnant?

I heard some rumors about Ultimate next year. I’ll put them in order of confidence:

1) Everyone will wear helmets next year through Regionals. Nationals: same rules as always, no helmets.
2) All three captains of Revolver are gone for next season (2 retirees and 1 traveler). I sort of had it tucked in the back of my head to play with them this year, but now I’m not so sure. We’ll see.
3) Jam is way more talented than Revolver and has less character.
4) Wendy Chan has a several photo spread of a layout D she got on game point against Shazam in semis against a dude (Jon Ladd to be exact). It’s in the UPA Newsletter I think. Check it out.

Yeah, those last three may/may not be true, but the first one is certain. I suggest Gaia chinstraps by the way. Very comfortable, but order them now if you want them to get across the border by the Fall Series.

I’ve been thinking about the old body and about some of the “greats” of frisbee past lately. There are many that played at the top for however long or not even at the top for however long, and now their bodies are wrecked. It’s a little concerning. I don’t want to have all kinds of junky joints and handicaps as I raise my kids. When we’re playing in the Townhouse Backyard, I want to be able to run around and bend and jump and do all those sort of things with my kids. Basically, I NEVER want to lose in a game of 1-on-1 basketball against my child. The reason I play Ultimate today is to be in shape for when that day rolls around and my kid is up 9-8 in a game to 10 in the backyard. I will beat him. I will rise to that challenge. I will foul him flagrantly if he comes into the lane. This is my house. Ya betta know dat, son!

I think Ultimate is doing a fine job of preparing me mentally but perhaps not physically for that challenge. What if I get really hurt and ruin my whole “knee area” or my whole “face area” (those are medical terms)? Hell, my room-mate had surgery on his eye after playing one game of winter league. I’m not sure this is the best sport for people who want to not be broken old people.

And on that note, Merry Christmas to all of you in the US. If you are not in the US, rot. Cho, I’m looking at you…although I can’t see you because you are very small and at a great distance. If you are reading this, feel my cyber-gaze.

Oh, and Jews. Hope that festival went well. That’s a pretty cute little holiday you guys have. Awesome. Jews.

It’s Christmas time in Townville. We are all gathered in Pompano Beach, FL to annualize our love for each other. How do I love thee? Let me count the years that I have come to this same place in the month of December.

This year, we tried something new: not playing tennis. Here’s some pictures of the tennis we didn’t play.

(footage not found)

I’d just like to make positive mentions or “Pos Mens” of two gifts in particular. Mama Town has a tradition of giving Jess and I a particular gift every year. For Jess, it’s an angel. For me, it’s a nutcracker. However, this year, she took it to the next level and created a nutcracker of me at Nationals in all my Brass Monkey gear. For Jess, she created this bike-riding angel. I think the symbolism is quite powerful. I have powerful jaws that can be controlled from my lower back in real-life, and Jess is a messenger from God in real-life. That’s why it makes sense.

Here are the pictures:

“The Pilgrims ventured into a new land bonded by a common past. On this Thanksgiving Vinnie and I have chosen to make an equally bold journey together into adulthood…or eachother. Whatever.”
-Doogie Howser’s Journal Entry from Thanksgiving ‘92

“You know, I was thinking the other day.”
-Kevin Nealon

“There’s only one b-tch in the world. One b-tch with many faces.”
-Jay in Chasing Amy

I guess I just wanted to say Merry Christmas to everyone in Chicago and elsewhere. I grew up with you guys. R.T., I lost my virginity to your daughter, for crying out loud! Rob, you were there.

I guess you could say that nothing I’m saying is original. You could. You could also get a good look at a T-bone steak by sticking your head up a bull’s ass, but wouldn’t you rather take the butcher’s word for it?

I’m just sitting at work right now at 5:30 on Black Wednesday listening to Sarah-McLachlan. Sunday I was sitting in a tea shop in Piedmont listening to Sarah-Welsh. Next week, maybe I’ll be starting Sarah-P (read that name with a lisp). That would be nice; having someone who just listens. Why don’t you just sit the next couple of plays out, Champ? Stop talking for awhile.

Do you ever worry about nothing really at all? Low-level anxiety, I’ve heard it called. I have that. It’s like a knot in my stomach. Every single outcome is ok with me, but I’m still stuck in a worried state. The Wayside State.

I’m on the brink of being happier than I’ve ever been in my entire life. More available, more plugged in, more serene, less bullshit, less worry, less judgment. I don’t know exactly what it will look like. I think it’ll come though.

I’m thankful for:

Linda S.
Mama Town
Papa Town
Anger
Jessica
Frisbee
Idris
electric fans
Becky
Gunder
Jonny Rem
Grandma Rose
my house
my life
Stephen
Will
Pat
ankle sprains
gum
fiddle
bass
my childhood
discgolf
Frodo
Mader

Let’s eat until our hearts stop.

There were a lot of great things that happened this weekend at Nationals. I talked to Becky about life. I said what-up to Vijay after he sent me a benediction last week. I saw that Mischief is a really great group of people who care about each other immensely. I saw Tim Murray as a pretty respectable, mature individual who loves the game (that was really over the course of the season and not just this weekend). I saw the Ring/Backhoe social circles in motion. I saw how nothing really changes in that regard and how the lowest common denominator: drinking, mocking, hooking up, and other pretty dumb things seem to shine through in most cases. I felt the tug towards romance, and resisted it. I struggled not to judge myself and my team-mates at times. By Sunday, some of my better friends on the team had become so irritating to me that it was almost too much to be in a room with them.

Mischief lost in Quarters. Shazam showed up and played hard in all their games. They are good folks. I saw my humor turn towards ridicule and mockery this weekend instead of just light-hearted observation. I saw stress and anxiety bring out the best in some people (our late innings come-back against Shazam really made me happy to be on Brass Monkey). I saw one of the sickest D’s I’ve ever seen AGAIN from Wendy Chan on game-point against Shazam against a guy (Ladd). It was just unbelievable. Better, I think, than the one last year in semis that Wendy had. I saw Nate, the guy I would lie down in traffic for, one of the greatest team-mates and players I’ve ever seen grace a field, not win a title this year.

The sacrifices that people make to be at Nationals and to play at Nationals are unreal. I think maybe the best moments of the weekend were Saturday night after games were over, seasons were over, and dinner was over. Monkey sat around one of our condo units and told stories and gave speeches and just really enjoyed each other. I laughed more on Saturday night than I have since the last session of One Degrees in Tempe. What a soulful, filling experience it is to just laugh with each other.

I got to introduce Nate and Becky on Saturday night. It was like introducing someone to my family. I got to just say, “Look, Becky. This is the guy that I’ve told you about. This is why I love playing for him.” They talked for 10 seconds and Nate drove the conversation as he does the huddle, and it was just pure and simple. She looked at me after Nate had left, and I could just see that she understood. In 10 seconds, she just understood why I like him.

The first time I went to Nationals was in 2004, and I had been diagnosed with mono on Monday and was not able to play at all. My team, Machine, went 0-7, my new girlfriend at the time, Sarah, had way cooler friends than mine (Brood et al), and way cooler ex-boyfriends than me (Michael Jamkung, formerly Namkung). I had a knot in my stomach that weekend as big as a fist and I didn’t play a single point. I do believe the antibiotics that I had taken gave me a skin reaction that made me look like I had frickin pink polka dots all over my body too. I was so terribly unhappy. I was so hurt and hopeless.

My second trip to Nationals was in 2006 with Brass, and I had not played a point of Ultimate (other than the weekend prior) since the end of August due to a horrible ankle sprain. I wasn’t sure that I would be able to play at all. I prayed that my higher power’s will be done and that I could just be present and do his will. I played and played great. I really brought joy to my team, and in our big semifinal loss, I played one point, and I didn’t feel, at any time, like I was being cheated. I wasn’t hurt or hopeless. I was proud and honored to be on this team. My team had a lot wrong with it that year, but it had a lot right with it too. We have a rookie this year named Mike that reminds me of me last year. He’s just happy and proud to be with this group, and that’s a really awesome way to approach Ultimate, I think. On Saturday night last year, I left the team dinner to be with a good friend in a hard moment and grew closer to a few people. I wasn’t the life of the party that night. I wasn’t making some hot girl. I wasn’t doing anything but being me and doing what I thought was right. That was awesome.

This year, I went to Nationals healthy for the first time, again with Brass Monkey. This year, we had something that we didn’t have last year: the ability to pull together and play big in big moments. Our hearts weren’t fragmented and in close games, we were able to play up. I wish that we could have given ourselves a chance against Shazam instead of dropping down to a 7 point deficit and not getting our engine started until 12-5 or whenever it was. We played them to 11-14 and were really close to a couple blocks on that final point. It’s a little too much to ask to score 5 in a row against a great team like Shazam with the season on the line. I wouldn’t have put it past us though, the way we were playing.

On a personal note, I don’t think I’ve ever pulled as well as I did this weekend. They were huge airy bombs and they were all in bounds until the Shazam game. I would kind of like to just go up to Seattle or somewhere and scrimmage Shazam for 4 or 5 hours with Brass. I just like playing against them. I want to play a lot of points against them. It’s really fun. I don’t have very much fun at all against Mischief, and I’m not entirely sure why. I guess I can’t really think of anyone on that squad I like to guard for some reason. With Tyler, I’m usually backing him. With Kyle Smith, I’m usually busy nearly biting my tongue off while he elbows me in the face. With Shazam, it’s just a battle though. I love it. They are good, they are fast, the throws are on the mark, and for whatever reason, I like playing them. I like playing d and beating them and mashing their faces into a fine paste and then dousing their faces in kerosine and lighting them on fire and then breaking their mark, zipping down field for a wide-open 15 yd under and throwing a buttery goal to Nate up the line, while a faceless Shazamer runs after me with his burnt eyes trying to figure out what happened and why he will always be hideous for the rest of his life and never have children or friends. Whoa, sorry about that. What I mean to say is: Ultimate is fun.

This week’s episode of the Chris Farley show:

Chris Farley: Hey, Steve Finn. ‘member when you were on Sockeye?

Steve Finn: Well, yeah Chris, I do.

CF: Man, you guys were awesome…

SF: Why thank you, Chris.

CF: ………God, I’m so STUPID. I’m such an IDIOT.

SF: No, no, Chris, you’re doing fine…

CF: Really?…Oh, man…..You remember when you were on Brass Monkey?

SF: Yeah, yeah I remember, we won it in 2005.

CF: Man, you guys were soooo good….

SF: Thanks, Chris.

CF: …..God, I don’t know what I’m DOING on this interview. I’m such a FAILure….

SF: You’re doing fine, Chris. Really.

CF: You’re just saying that.

SF: No, really, Chris.

CF: Well…remember when you won your third consecutive Masters title at age 47?

SF: Chris, I’m not sure that’s happened yet although I’m sure it will.

CF: Oh….why did I SAY that?! I’m such a MORON!

SF: No, Chris. You’re really giving a good interview.

CF: No, I’m not. I’m making all kinds of mistakes all the time.

SF: Well, Chris. You know I’ve learned over the years that it’s not about whether you do things perfectly or not. Everyone makes mistakes. It has more to do with whether your mistakes ever result in something other than a National Championship. I think that’s where I’ve had a lot of success in my life. I only make mistakes that somehow lead to me being a National Champion.

CF: ….

I saw Ray Parrish’s teeth from about 500 yards away, and a few minutes later, I could see that the rest of him was also there as he continued to walk towards me. That guy was so huge for me at Sandblast when I had heatstroke and couldn’t take care of myself. I would marry him if I were some girl with really huge fake breasts, the way he likes. Sidenote: Can I just say that the reason Starsky and Hutch is a masterpiece is because it makes fun of homophobia? Can I just say that right now? I have made a living on that kind of humor (or no money at all as I look a little closer), and guys acting like they have no emotions and like they don’t care about their friends or anything for that matter is just not human. I care about my friends.

Thank you to Bil Elsinger for all the great photos and write-ups of the Mixed Division this year, which is a real division with uniforms and everything.

Dragon foot, ball of yarn, bamboo pole, Chinese boy…Prune Candy.

When’s Tempe?

Cheers

So my team does cheers after games sometimes. Not really all that often these days as my room-mate, Henrik (the mastermind behind all of the cheers), is no longer an active player on the team, but we still do some crazily elaborate cover-cheers when he makes it out. Last year the big hit was Gin and Juice (the Gourds - folky version) “mind on my monkey and my monkey on my mind” kinda thing. It was a solid jam with me laying some heavy fiddle on it and Lauren Casey filling it out with some mando. We never did get around to doing a cover version of Devil Went Down to Georgia, although on the train in to work the other day, a homeless guy sitting near my feet asked me if I had a viola in the case, and I said “Naw, it’s a fiddle”, and he immediately launched into the first few verses of that Charlie Daniels classic on a crowded commuter train. Awesome. Thank you so much for doing that. Without grassroots support from people like you, this day would never have been made possible (the words of Aaron W, my former room-mate from Paulina).

Back to the lecture at hand. This year, I have some work to do to cover a really tricky riff from some Chili Peppers song called “Hey-o” maybe and an awesome bassline from a Beck tune. If you are going to Nationals and are in our pool, that’s good news for you. If not, maybe get elinimated before us and then check out some of the post-game magic.

Why do I like the cheers? It really brings this great energy to the team. It is something that is very Brass Monkey, and without it, it just doesn’t feel like the team for some reason. We F around a lot and have a good time regardless, but cheers bring it to another level. It’s also indicative of the idea that Brass plays great Ultimate because we’re having fun and enjoying each other. Last year, in my opinion, we didn’t enjoy each other as much. There was some chemistry that was a little off, and there was a general lack of ease that isn’t there this year that kept us from playing great when we needed to. That is not to say that we will go any further or even as far as we did last year, but I think the soul of the team is intact this season. It feels good and loving. Sidenote: maybe one of the things that I don’t completely like about Open is that this loving piece is pretty much missing. At least it doesn’t show up in the same way as it does in coed. Nothing says loving like spiking on each other in practice and kicking a water bottle. What Open gives up on the positivity scale, it may make up for on the humor scale though. Ladies, I love you, but guys are just WAY funnier. I met this guy once. Oh man. So funny.

Flying, Magic

So Regionals briefly: it was cold, windy, and rainy. Needless to say, I excelled in that environment coming from the Midwest and practicing on the shores of Lake Michigan for 3 years in college. We had a relatively easy road to finals with arguably the easiest pool (Bozos, Night Train, and Denial) and Golden Spike upsetting Mischief to face us in semis. Golden Spike, by the way, is a phenomenal team, and deserves to be at Nationals. However, since they have a couple of guys on their team that are COMPLETE pricks, no one is too sorry to hear that they lost 3, count them, 3 games to go to finish 5th. Our game against Shazam was VERY upwind-downwind, and each team had 2 breaks I believe. 12-11 was the final with both teams essentially holding serve. These guys play really well. I like playing against them because they don’t cheat, they don’t really get chippy, and they play good Ultimate, even though they have one of the stupidest names I’ve ever heard. By the way, there is an awesome story about Shazam in this month’s issue of Poof magazine. With Shazam, everything is so dramatic and flamboyant; it makes me just want to set myself on fire!

Ok, enough. Love from the Left.

My team-mate Coco likes to say that the most meaningless stat in sports is the halftime score. The second most meaningless stat is who won Northern California Mixed Sectionals (unless you count last year when that team went on to win Nationals). I’ve lost my point.

Reset button.

Brass played great. The sun shone. The children laughed and danced. That one kid shouted angrily and just gritted his teeth for 8 bars when I gave him one of my solos. There was singing and laughing and guitar-playing and fiddling. There were beers to be drank and teams to be heckled. There was a full beer can to be thrown at my chest by a girl named Molly who thought that would be funny. You’re not funny, Molly. Go away and give me back any beer that you have on your person.

Mischief was missing Tyler and it was windy. Both of those things played to our strenths. I am still very happy about a decisive win over Mischief. Of course, Sectionals means nothing, and the score is officially 0-0 again. Nothing that happened counted. The Flycoons are really frickin good (even with Tim Murray on the roster), Mischief is really frickin good (’06 champs), Shazam is really frickin good (’04 champs reloaded with 1 loss on the season), and then there’s Family Style (SC studs with awesome women), CTR (deep and good), Horde (formerly Whore$hack), Golden Spike (punked us at Labor Day on Sunday morning), and at least two more teams that could play big at any time and beat damn near anyone. I hate our region sometimes. Other times I really love it. Regionals should be fun. If we get out of our region, then there’s a bunch more teams, not the least of which is Slow White who is the only team that has beaten us at Nationals since 2004 (2005 in pool play, 2006 in semis). My captain, Nate, always responds to news of really good teams or great players being picked up by our rivals/opponents with “Great, I wouldn’t want to win any other way.” Or something like that. I like that attitude. I want to beat all these teams at their best. I want us to be our best and to just be better than their best. That would be fun.

Oh, details? Yeah, I don’t know many details really. Our deep game was clicking against Mischief, even in the high winds, and we took half by a lot and never let them back in. Final score: 15-8? Not really sure. This was not Mischief’s best effort by any stretch.

I somehow missed Revolver beating Jam at Sectionals. That is pretty cool. Idris blogged that Revolver would pretty much have to be the 2 seed at NW Regionals with Furious as a 4 seed or else there would be some flawed logic. Idris is always right.

Dudes and female-dudes, it’s time for some of that hot nasty Frizbone action. Brass Monkey is going to compete until you can’t feel anything but pure ecstasy. We are going to swing your dumps and pump it deep to our streaking strikers. We are going to have intercourse on your team, bigtime. Here’s a picture of me intercoursing two people.

Yeah, the series starts this weekend, and as Zaz would say, “I’m getting old and I like math.”

We get to play Mischief this weekend who is missing (I presume) Tyler Grant who is “the straw stirring the drink” for that team with a pretty bad ankle sprain. They’re pretty damn good without him though. A win against them would be big because they have a couple of girls that are faster and taller than me or so, and their offense is REALLY hard to deal with because they throw to people that aren’t open and oftentimes do that without putting any air under the disc. It’s like playing Ball State or something where you have your guy so covered that you just assume the throw won’t go up and then the guy catches it behind your head and you bitch at your team-mates for not making “up” calls because you’re still blaming your parents for your shortcomings as a man. Actually, that wasn’t really as much of a hypothetical as it was a snapshot from my past.

We, Brass Monkey, played Shazam twice a couple of weeks ago on home court at Labor Day and split games with them. They have Steve Finn on their team, who is extremely old and also plays boardgames with people on my team when he comes to town. I still don’t understand the boardgame thing. Tony, Carlo: I don’t get it. They were boring when I was a kid, and they’re still boring. You guys should hang out with Steve Finn. Anyway, other than that one loss, Shazam has had their way with everybody they’ve played this year, including the final of that tourney in decisive fashion over Brass. Mischief has had a couple of close ones with Shazam, including once being up 7-2 or something in pool play at ECC and then losing on double-game I think. Shazam is still clearly the team to beat in the coed division, but luckily, I love beating the team to beat. There’s nothing more gratifying than playing big and upsetting a 1-seed and then taking all their girls out for a nice seafood dinner and then never calling them again.

There’s literally nothing better. I challenge you to find something better than that…………..Dorothy Mantooth is a saint.

Time to take Glucosamine, Chondroitin, and MSM combo pills. Is everybody ok after the meningitis outbreak? That’s a serious disease from what I understand.

Here are some pictures (poached from Bea’s blog) of Wyatt Riot’s show last Friday. It was at Pier 23 which is a bar that they named an entire pier after - talk about unoriginal - and it happens to be next to the bay which is where we play and make things out of clay. It was a damn good time and the alcohol tasted like a giant glass of “freedom” (which is a concept and now also a taste). Damien showed up and convinced the barstaff to concoct a long island iced tea in a bucket because who wants to get a bunch of glasses dirty? He then proceeded to allegedly tell the girl I was chatting with that on a scale of 3 to 13, she was a 7. Thanks, buddy. Glad I didn’t even invite you so that you could show up, drink my bonus and insult the girl I am hitting on. Good looking out.

In other news, the Labor Day Ultimate Champies are this weekend with coed up in SF and Open/Women down in Santa Cruz. It should be a pretty solid tournament as usual and if nothing else changes this weekend, I will be living in a place called the Pink Palace when it’s over. Nothing gay about that. Let’s a do a quick recap of my life as a straight male since last spring:

In the beginning, I am in a long-term relationship with a woman (Dr. Welsh) in the heartland.

Then….

1) I move to San Francisco, gay mecca, to “explore something new”.
2) My relationship quickly falls apart.
3) I move to the city to “explore something new.”
4) I begin biking a lot and drinking cocktails when I go out.
5) I move to a bright pink house.
6) I put some of my hanging clothes in the closet.
7) I come out of the closet.

So anyway, I live in a pink house in the Sunset and I love Extreme Frisbee. As Joe Ferrari would say, sweet. (Here’s a picture of me hanging out with my guy friends in San Francisco. That guy in the shades is definitely checking me out.)

“Is there anything more beautiful than a beautiful, beautiful flamingo, flying across in front of a beautiful sunset? And he’s carrying a beautiful rose in his beak, and also he’s carrying a very beautiful painting with his feet. And also, you’re drunk.” -Jack Handey

So at ECC this weekend, the Buzz Bullets descended on the US. They won worlds in Perth, AUS last November, and everybody kind of wrote that win off since a lot of the top men’s teams didn’t make it down to Worlds. They came to ECC this weekend though and really frustrated teams. I saw some of their semifinal against Jam and most of their final against Sockeye (which they lost on double-game-point after being up the whole game).

On D, they run a transition zone-man-zone that my friend Stephen was trying to describe to me, having played against them before in international competitions. They apparently come down in zone, flip to man, and then they go BACK into zone or something like that. It’s pretty confusing, and I’m no strategist, so you’ll have to read more about it from the “thinkers” out there. One other thing they do is bid huuuuge. They are springy and explode on their lay-outs.

On O, they force throws through traffic and jam it up the line and throw outside-in hucks that don’t hang in the air and just are faster than their opponents a lot of the time. A couple of throws went up in the final that just looked like poor choices really, but BB read them well and were really effective even against the big guys. In the rain, they all had these really cool gloves too. I’ve gotta look into these gloves because the catches they were making in traffic were pretty fantastic.

They are sponsored by a “shutter company” (not sure if it’s camera shutters or window shutters), and most of them work there. They’re all really tight and play and work together, and they all have all the skills. That was a really noticeable difference: they’re not specialized like US teams. (Note to self: move to Japan for that reason alone.) On Sockeye, you’ve got Chase and Nord dominating in the air, Ben Wiggins and Jeremy Cram exclusively behind the disc, and a bunch of other highly specialized O and D players. The Buzz Bullets all have great skills, all play both sides of the disc well, and are all EXTREMELY FAST and hyper-intelligent…and hairless.

Nord got skyed twice this weekend by guys that were about a foot shorter than him on the Buzz Bullets. Pretty sick springy bids by these guys. All in all, they really won over the crowd and everybody was rooting for them and at times booing certain members of Sockeye. It seems like BB is on to something that the rest of the world may need to get wise to or be overtaken, like in so many other areas other than sex, by the Japanese.

I guess the only other comment I wanted to make was that this game was played really cleanly. There were no cheap calls that I could see, and Sockeye did not make any calls to give themselves the edge. There were a couple of times that I expected a foul-call when the Buzz Bullets made a physical play on a high disc and in Sockeye’s defense, they did not stop play and just hustled back on D. I thought this was awesome. It inspired me to play cleaner Ultimate and really take it on myself to win the damn disc, no matter what.

In the coed division, Brass played pretty poorly. We are ironing out some things and were not short on players by any stretch (with 20 or so). We lost to Flaming Moe, Shazam, Slow White, and Mischief. We beat Horde (Whoreshack) and Flycoons (they are really good this year having picked up Tim Murray and what’s-her-face). There was a great moment where I called a foul on an accidental collision Basically, I started coming under after a deep cut and then Greenough ripped a bomb to the back of the endzone and so I turned back around and ran into my defender who was trailing by about 10 yards and didn’t see the disc go up. Timmy yelled from the sideline, “No one from Northwestern could’ve gotten that disc.” Luckily, one of his other team-mates standing close to me said I had a play on it. Nice spirit, guy.

Shazam handled everyone except Mischief who gave them the game after being up 7-2 only to lose on double-game-point. I think the rematch in the final went to Shazam as well and it was not a 1-point win. I don’t know the score though. They beat us in a rainy, zone-y, game in which we took half and then lost 11-15. Their trap zone looked pretty good, and they were trapping on both sidelines.

That’s all I have to report from ECC. I saw Becky and met her boyfriend, Pat. I approve.

Good Morning, United States.

Now I will begin vomiting all over this blog, much in the same way I vomited all over the finals of Sandblasty except instead of red gatorade, it will be metaphors. Also, I *think* I can use capitalization and punctuation because my sister is no longer able to stop me. If this sentence and the title of the post aren’t followed by a bunch of commas, then I am wrong. , , , , , ,,,, , ,, , , ,, , , ,,, ,

I’d update you on the West Coast, but what is there to say really? It’s way better than everywhere else, people are open-minded, the straight-male-to-straight-female ratio is 1:10 in San Francisco, and the straight-male-to-gay-male ratio is also 1:10 in San Francisco. In other words: I’m kind of a big deal out here. I’ve been walking around the city, whipping my hair wildly in the summer (50 degree summer) breeze and occasionally turning abruptly to freeze a whole block of Market St. with a little “blue steel”. I usually arch my back when I do that…like a dragon.

Enough about casual though, what about Ultimate? Well, here’s the deal. July out here is for the most part everyone’s break for the season. Players enjoy kayaking, hiking, camping, surfing, and making sweet love on their wives. What have I been doing? Oh, the usual: almost dying at Sandblast, writing profiles for the Brass website (http://brassmonkeyultimate.googlepages.com), and not hating my parents anymore. Yeah, you read that right. I sort of stopped doing that a few weeks ago and by communicating that across the internet, I am making it even more real.

The team I took to Sandblast was called Dago Tea (pronounced “day go tee”) and was dedicated to my mom, Mary Jane, aka Mama Town. We celebrated our Italian heritage and family, and I think that was part of a shift that really took place the following weekend at this thing called the Landmark Forum. Now, Landmark is a little weird, but it sort of gave me permission to make some changes in my life that I really like, and it talks a lot about keeping your past behind you, living a life of possibility, and creating whatever meaning you want, instead of letting your past dictate the meanings of things in your life.

One of the possibilities I created was being responsible for loving my Mom and Dad, exactly as they are and with all of our history. I always have the choice to resent them and in doing so avoid responsibility in my own life. “If my parents hadn’t raised me the way they did, I wouldn’t be such a moody bastard right now.” It’s a fun game with big payoffs and even bigger costs. The costs are that I am not present in my life a lot of the time, and I don’t take responsibility at times for my work, my play on the field, and for my relationships.

…

I feel a little bit like Ron Burgundy after he says, “And that, of course, was our newest reporter, Veronica, Corningstone. She’s really great. I’d also like to share with you that we are currently dating and that she is quite a handful in the bedroom.” Maybe I shouldn’t have broadcast all that to the world, but what can I say. I love my parents, and I wanted to sing it from on top of a mountain, but I didn’t have a mountain, I had a blog and new priveleges from my sister…

So back to disc, Brass starts practices up again next week, ECC (or Spawnfest for the coed division) is in 3 weeks up near Seattle, and the coed division is crushingly good this year. Mischief is returning its all-star cast (including Tyler Grant who played Dago Tea at Sandblast), Shazaam Returns is a Seattle powerhouse team that went out to Boston and dominated for the most part and boasts one of the all-time greats in Steve Finn (Let’s recap his last 3 years of Ultimate, shall we? ‘06 Masters National Champion with Throwback catching a callahan on championship point, ‘05 Mixed National Champion with Brass Monkey, ‘04 Open National Champion with Sockeye), and Slow White is making the trip out from Boston after losing in Finals of Nationals last year to Mischief and beating Brass in semis. It should be a good time, and I hear that they have decided to have Open and Women compete this year as well. How fun for them.

I just joined a new band out here called The Wayside State which you can check out here: http://www.myspace.com/thewaysidestate. They have really good, original songs, and all they want me to do is solo on the fiddle. Perfect.

I’m the CTown Hustler; you stay classy, planet earth.

Hi, everyone. Mr. Town here, Miss Casual’s brother. Check out our new site:

www.casualtown.com
: ist das Community Browsergame FORREALZ-ischlagen!

Let’s catch up real quick: How are you doing in Chicago? Nice. Yeah, good to hear; I was going to ask you about that, so it all worked out then? Oh, it didn’t. Sorry to hear that. Well she wasn’t right for you anyway. Oh she was, and it was your fault? Yeah, well I mean, I guess life goes on. It doesn’t? Listen, I didn’t want to get into a whole discussion here, but seriously, we used to be friends and I remember that.

I’m doing fine out here in SF. I live in the city now, and let me tell you something: dudes love some dudes out here. I mean, I think it goes deeper than friendship in a lot of ways, especially one way. It’s not affecting me though. I’m straight as an arrow, and nothing will change that. I don’t even give awkwardly long hugs to guys more than once a week or so. That’s a fact.

Anyway, here’s a day in the life so that you can get an idea of what my life is like these days (Midwest translation is in brackets so you can follow what I’m saying): I get up at 7:30 (9:30 CST) and take a shower. I hop on my normal bike for losers (fixed-gear bike) and hit the road. I’m hella tired (tired), but I hop on the downhill slope (like the Midwest but kinda slanted) and just coast for a while. I realize that I forgot to shave, and then notice a few girls (lesbians) riding bikes alongside of me who also forgot to shave…their faces. It’s cool though. I breeze by a couple Carl’s Jr’s (Hardees) and swerve to avoid hitting an old Asian women (black guy). I work for 8 hours (10 hours), and then I marvel at the beauty of the Bay Area on my way to watching the Warriors (Bulls) go down 1-3 to the Jazz (Pistons). I then go to sleep in an 800 sq. ft. 3 BR apartment (3500 sq. ft. 4 BR) while my openly gay room-mate (…errr…) watches South Park.

Here’s your pre-season scouting report for Ultimate out here in the Yay Area:

COED:

Brass Monkey: Sweethearts, great leadership, returning their core for one last go of it. Expect a good year from them. I may roster up with them again since it was such a great experience last year, and they have a spot at representing the US in VanCouver in ‘08 if they finish at the top this year.

Mischief: Defending National Champs in the coed division. They have one guy that wins all their games for them: Tyler Grant. He is back again. They will win again.

WOMEN:

Fury: They picked up five really good players, and they just happen to have an amazingly good coach: Matty Tsang. He’s the reason they will win again when it counts.

New Team: This other women’s team that is a mixture of Homebrood (RIP) and Skyline. They have no identity and fragmented leadership (a la Justice League last year). They will probably have a tough year.

MEN:

Jam: Idris is captaining again this year, and Hollywood and the Body (aka Greg Husak and Brandon Steets) are coming up from the Condors to join an already stacked team. These guys don’t seem to play with a lot of heart, but this team has the players to win a title if it all comes together. They’re also no longer pretending not to be Jam. I’ve been trying out with these dudes, and it’s a lot of fun.

Revolver: Lot of ex-Stanford on this team. They play small ball, breaking the mark, taking high-percentage passes, and really grinding with teams. There’s some great chemistry on this team, and they are looking to add some height (possibly me) to their roster. We’ll see if it’s a fit. Nick Handler is something else. I’ve never been impressed with dump cuts before or seen a guy who is 5′7″ go deep as well as he does. Rivaled maybe only by Josh Wiseman (same team, same height, almost solely a deep).

I guess that’s all there is to say. I will be at Poultry Days with USDA, getting there early on Friday and staying Sunday night if you wanna hang. I’ll be at Sandblast (Thu-Tues) with Dago Tea, a really fun crew mostly from the Bay. Let me know your plans for those two. Unless you’re Jacob Dee. Then just sit tight and wait for your spanking.

Chuck

Good evening, because whatever time it is in Cali, it’s always 11 PM in Chicago due to time change.