(Counterpoint) TiV

Trouble in Vegas 2010 was a learning experience for pretty much everyone involved. While Cultimate was laughing their asses off for the weekend and rolled in gold coins like Scrooge McDuck, the wimmynz team learned how to play brrr pong, Ball Sachs learned how to spike a game point score, and Jake learned how to spell the word "catheter" (he spelled it "cathider" in a 12:46 pm text message to the Bungalo Bros). Even Hupps learned a new word, "coliseum," though I'm not sure he knows how to use it yet. And while I'm more prone to associate him with the sitcom character Alf than the Alph River, we're certainly very proud of him.

Three things we can work on before Spring Break (!oow) to get some solidified coke lines and build some full-strength conditioning shampoo:

-in cuts. Even from the limited footage I took, it is increasingly obvious that running back and forth horizontally (or just standing still) is not a good way to get the disc in your hands. Cut in. If you don't get the disc, clear to the wings. If you get the disc, take a second or two to look upfield and maybe throw in a fake or actually make that continuation, but if you've got nothing, then get it back to a handler.

-handler movement. Guilty as charged. For example, we were by and large unable to run the wrap on the sideline and even when we did, it was not as effective as it should have been at opening up the rest of the field. This is definitely something we can drill over and over indoors, but we've got to really get on the same page with this.

-cheers. With the exception of Smutbro's "Sons of Gondor, of Rohan" speech, there was a serious paucity of pump-up cheers. I'm looking at you, Bänkenstein. "h" is Planck's constant. Bohr doesn't have a constant. He's got models and formulae galore, but he used Planck's constant and had no constant to his own name.

As Hupp-Alf said, we've been cooped up in Crown all season, and we'll be cooped up for another few weeks. Let's make the most of our time. Let's get mentally and physically fit. Also, we really need to work on our tans.

Baby Craig

Captain

University of Chicago Mens Competitive Tanning Team

Look Out World...

Well, I've finally decided that it's time to due my fatherly duty and enter the ring with Jake and Craiggers. This coliseum will erupt with manly pleasures, people weighing under 150 pounds, and one summer of club experience. Words will spew forth like Alph, the sacred river, and I will point out a similarity between Jake and Skyla with every post.

Vegas was hella frustrating (and a little scary on Sunday morning). We've been cooped up in Crown since the beginning of the calendar year, and our one chance this quarter to play outside was cut short. Balls. We didn't get a chance to really see people's strengths, and we didn't get many opportunities to work on offensive and defensive sets we wanted to try. Now we're back indoors until Spring Break (woo!), and we'll have to do what we can to get some solidified lines and build some full-field chemistry. When we get back from Georgia, we'll have just a few short weeks to pull our shit together for Sectionals, but at this point, we're restricted to small spaces, visualization, and hard conditioning. That being said, Vegas most certainly had its moments, like Dinger Dan pulling off a chest hair for Shane/Zubair, and it was just really unfortunate to have rain for the second year in a row. While I anticipate that we will look at other winter tournament options going forward, I would say that there is still a good chance we'll be returning to Vegas next year with hopes of good weather and great ultimate.

At this point, we're continuing on with our pod workouts, looking forward to Spring Break, and getting pumped for Sectionals and Regionals.

Arriving fashionably late,
Hupps


P.S. - Jake and Skyla have the same number of vowels in both their first and last names (y-inclusive).

Word of the Day: Catheter… (TiV 2010, Part 3)

Sunday promised to be an interesting day, as we knew already knew that there would be no frisbee to be had. Therefore, everyone slept in and we took our time packing up to get out of the hotel before the 11 AM check out. Our room was surprisingly intact considering the strain that had been put on it the night before and we all woke up to look hazily around the room and try to remember why our buttholes ached in the way they did.

Somehow, my clothes had ended up scattered around the room and Chupps had curled himself up under the fitted sheet on our bed. Anyway, we slowly roused ourselves and took stock in the situation. Jake? Check. Hupps? Check. BANK? Check. Dead Pan Dan? Check. Huge? Check. Hmmm… I guess everyone else slept in the other room. Walked over there and deuced some of their cinnamon raisin bagels and shiz and then walked back. Walked back and forth a few times listlessly. Wait. Wait. Ten, eleven, twelve… someone is missing. Where’s Shane? All his stuff is still here… Does anyone remember seeing him around? Not answering his phone. Maybe he slept at the bungalow… Call up my ho… YO, Baby, you guys got Shane? Alright, thx anyway. Maybe he’s with the girls… BonanzaRae, you got a creepy 28-year-old? No, I know Jesse is only 22, I meant Shane. Oh well, thanks anyway.

A missing Shane, eh? This sounds like a job for Daphne! Daphne! Scooby-Doo! We finished packing up and Chupps and I got in a quick game of find the butthole while BANK checked out. Wait, what’s this? Young Sasha has a clue. Shane was last seen getting a car with the Titcombs you say? Rohre? What else, boy? Shane chugged a quarter of a handle before he left. OH BOY! A decision was made that the majority of the team would head to the airport while a select strike force comprised of Bold Craig, Sky Patrol Captain Hupps, Sasha the Bluer, BANK “The BANK” calderBANK, and Pressels searched for Shane at the Bellagio (Rohre’s last known location), and the Bungalow boy-toys searched for him at IHOP.

Apparently, all the bungle-bro’s heard that Shane was really into maple syrup and so they decided to look for him between the pancakes in their $5 all-you-can eat short-stacks at IHOP. Additionally, Smutko thought that maybe he was hiding in a large plate of hash browns and veggies, and, being the good friend that he is, agreed to pay $11 in order to be allowed the opportunity to look for him. What a guy!

We, on the other hand, headed to the Bellagio with heavy hearts, wondering where our incorrigible buddy might be. We talked to the bellhops and Chupz got them to send a page over the intercom asking for Shin Cladwall or some dude. Semi-luckily, we ran into Vehro, who had taken out a room at the B-lage, and with him were Lisa and… maybe Lauren (Yeah, I looked through the Five Staff Bios) who had been with Shane at one point. They remembered him as the unbelievably drunk guy. Good. At least he’s memorable.

Not knowing what else to do, we headed over to The Bank, the Bellagio’s happening night spot, to see if maybe Shane had gone there with some inebriated notion of finding BANK McBANK there. However, although we managed to get a really good pic of an elevator sign that read “BANK”, Shane was nowhere to be found and there was no one there to give us a hint.

We proceeded out front where we came across two police officers and had just begun to ask them about where we might look to find a lost pal, when Jeffers’s voice crackled in Hupps’s ear to let us know that he had just gotten through to Shane, and that Shane was in some random hospital up north, alive, although probably still drunk. After another 15 minutes, we finally got in touch with Shane ourselves and pulled a U-ey on Las Vegas Blvd. to go get him.

At last, we arrived to find Shane, unbelievably dirty, with a cut above his left eye, arms swollen from hand-cuffs, still wearing his hospital shirt, sitting in an Arby’s enjoying a sandwich without a care in the world and no memory of what had occurred.

Vegas Baby!

D-bauch'd... (TiV 2010, Part 2)

Well… FUCK! We all were herded into our cars like cattle and Cyle Van Auken was heard yelling “Tits or GTFO” as all the cars rode off into the drizzle. We blasted Tik Tok and picked up some beer on the way home, wondering what the day had in store for us. Would we get to play more frisbitch or would all of Baby Craig’s wildest fantasies be realized? We all lazed around the hotel watching basketball for a while until Big Bad Shane got restless and got the old crew back together. Siege Pod took a field trip over to the Bungalow to rouse some support only to find that, not only was the bungalow a disappointment on all fronts, but all the bungalow brosephs had bro creamed all over the place and fallen asleep face down in the sticky mess. We stepped on CJizz, rolled Marchi out of bed, almost broke a window, flattered Zubie Dubie Doo, incurred the wrath of J-Mo(ney), and spoke unenthusiastically with NGB before we successfully brought the bungle-hos back to the world of the semi-lucid.

A cock-eyed plan was conceived to walk the strip and keep drinking, so we headed out falteringly with limited deliberation and even less purpose. We didn’t bring enough beer and were left with no choice but to continue to buy more and more beer as we continued down the strip, stopping into casinos to watch the Zoo-bear lose money and CabanaRae waste her time at the penny slots. Everyone was pounding beers and having a good old time, but no one was pounding them harder or getting drunker more quickly than good old Shane who loves nothing more when he is drunk than to talk about frisbee ad nauseum. We made our way all the way down to the Bellagio in order to see the fountain, but we missed it three or four times in a row for various reasons like going to the bathroom and talking to this real cool guy named Jason about how he was going to get us a VIP deal at Haze. Craiggers, Hupps, and I finally headed out into the rain to watch by ourselves, but it was some lame ass song, and we were pretty disappointed. Fortunately, we were able to convince everyone else to head back out to watch it with us the next time and we were treated to a beautiful rendition of “God Bless the USA”. I don’t think I have ever felt more patriotic pride than I did at that moment standing in front of the Bellagio, arm in arm with my teammates, belting along with Lee Greenwood.

After an over-priced dinner at Bally’s, we headed back south toward the Trop, in various states of inebriation. We decided that we would play beer pong, but, before we could, we needed thirty racks so Chupps, BANK, and I headed to Vons to git dem codez. Pretty dece. N2Hoops and I ran the table for a while doing some sick shit like sinking on the same cup and getting on FIYAH. I think the most cups we got in a turn was 7 or 8. We reached our breaking point finally and some lame team beat us.

Other highlights of the evening include:
-doing shots with Cyle Van Auken
-Terra getting real drunk
-Hupps spewing his bro cream all over the visitors from USC and Colorado
-Craig’s throne
-Dinger Dan dropping three tabs of acid and trying to eat all of our discs

My night ended as our room filled up with Colorado-B players and I, unable to stay awake, curled up with Hubbs to pass out fully clothed in the midst of the party.

I did not wake up fully clothed.

Hey, we played a little frisbee… (TiV 2010, Part 1)

Woke up in the morning feeling like P. Diddy. I grabbed my glasses and went out the door—about to hit the city. Before I left, I brushed my teeth with a bottle of Jack. Because, when we left for the night, we weren’t coming back.

Just as Ke$ha’s smash single Tik Tok was topping out on the Billboard Hot 40, JUNK headed to Las Vegas for what promised to be a thrilling weekend of spirited competition and drinking. All the coolest members of the team came out on Wednesday evening and enjoyed a day of roaming the strip, being under/overcharged at Denny’s, and chilling with some sweet track and field guys at a local high school. We were all surprised to hear that 5 had actually come through with our jerseys, and, staying true to their new motto (“sucking less”) for the moment, cultimate had not messed up our schedules..

At tournament registration that evening, we picked up the jerseys and they looked so fucking sick. Everyone, except Baby Craig, was psyched to be sporting such hot new designs, thanks to my main man, Mr. Reschechtko. According to Baby, however, they sucked. Man, I fucking hate that guy.

Now that the bungalow bitches had arrived, our team was 22 strong, and feeling like our nuts could explode at any moment. We were ready to get out on the field and run a fucking BOOYAH train on Lewis and Clark the next morning.

Rolled out to the fields the next morning rocking our sweet ass jerseys and started to warm up. J-Mo(ney), however, had taken his bedraggled band of bungalow buttfuckers for a couple extra spins around the block and ended up lost at the intersection of Smutko’s asshole and Baby Craig’s vagina. Luckily, they made it to the field on time, and our team proceeded to give Lewis and Clark the game. I threw a high release backhand for a score at one point, but besides that, there weren’t all that many highlights. Baby played… maybe two points. Our team decided that we would need to do better or something. Next on the agenda was UC-Irvine, another school about which we knew very little. JUNK played a much better game, although I don’t really remember all that much of it, and lost it on double game point. A heartbreaker for sure. Craig was warming up and probably played… three or four points. Then, thanks to some creative scheduling by cultimate, we had a three and a half hour bye, and, after debating going off to catch a matinee showing of Avatar, we headed out to eat some grubs (read: Taco Bell). We came back to the fields to watch Sam Kanner and Carleton almost get tooled on by Oregon, but hold on to win on Universe. We then began to mentally prepare for our game against Brown.

Although the score would indicate otherwise, our game against Brown probably contained some of the best Ultimate that we played during the weekend. The wind had picked up, and so we all went into the game knowing that it would play a large factor. During the first half, we played Brown really close, each team getting one break on the way to a tie at 5s. Our O-line was patient and aggressive, and our D-line was able to force some turns, although they were only able to convert one of the breaks. However, after that, everything went to shit and Brown won the game 13-5. An exciting start to an otherwise disappointing game. We showed that we could play with those chumps, but proceeded to screw the pooch big time.

Dinner for that night included many high(low)lights, for both meat eaters and vegetarians alike including:
-Hupps going on a Five-money power trip and challenging Ball Sachs to shove an animal style fry up his nose
-Old Craig riding Daisy Dynasty around the In-and-Out burger in preparation for the way he would ride him later that evening
-A joust between Shame and Evil Craig
-The woman at the Thai restaurant attempting to explain to J-Mo that the difference between Red and Green Curry is the one is red and one is green
-Terra being relatively civil… for a bit
-J-Mo offering to provide Ali with children
-Smutko’s fortune: Enjoy yourself while you still can.

After dinner, we had a few beers, and all hit the sack, dreaming dreams of our first win of the 2010 season. It looked like that win would not be long in coming, as, at the sound of the horn to start the first round on Saturday, our opponents were nowhere to be found. Craig was super pumped to rip his shirt off and get a sweet UCCMTT line out on the field. (Un)fortunately, the Montana Rum-drunkards or Bum-fuckers or something showed up, and we prepared for our game. Mr. Dexter told the Chalupa story again… something about getting gassy after eating a lot of Taco Bell; I might have missed the point. Tooled on some bitches for a while and took half 7-2, but then we all got distracted by Pretty Craig’s flowing locks and couldn’t stop watching the side line and let those drunk fucks bring it back to 9s. At some point during here, Binder talked back at something Shane said and so, in frustration, Shane slammed his shin through Binder’s nose and broke it. Binder took it like a champ though, and Shane got his due in the end (see pt. 3). Shane finally rolled himself to a boner at some point and got a nasty lay out D, but the bleeding didn’t really stop until BANKerson and N. Chupps called a time out and told us to stop fucking the dog. We sheepishly stopped and went on to win the game, the final score being caught by none other than BallSachs, who proceeded to spike the game-winning disc for his first college ultimate win. Congratulations were in order for Sachs, CJ, and Marchi who finally tasted the bittersweet acid-reflux of victory.

TiV 2010, raining slightly less, but cancelling a whole lot more.

To be cont’d.

Counterpoint: You Found Me?

Today, between 6:30 and 6:55 am, 13 meanderthals awoke before the crack of dawn and approached Krown Kastle ready to do battle. Where were you?

When everything was falling apart, 13 slackers and stoners abandoned their studies in pursuit of babes, budd, and bids in what promises to be the second soggy Trouble in Vegas Tournament in as many years. I spent all my day by the telephone, waiting for a safe arrival call from Jake. He calls me his bitch. It never rang. Call your bitch, bitch. All I needed was a call. It never came / To the corner of 54th and Maryland.

Lost and insecure, I found junkultimate.blogspot.com. Lying on the floor, surrounded by Jake's previously unopened textbooks and an as-of-then full bottle of moisturizer, I asked myself, Why'd you have to wait? I then splooged all over Jake's Natural Hazards book. Where were you? WHERE WERE YOU?

The rest of us, nine ferocious and nubile studs, disembarked from the Swilly City at various times and descended upon a place that our current president readily acknowledges is a moral and financial sieve (before he was forced to take it back).

Holy credit buttons and chip trays, Newman! We're going to Vegas! Let's try not to get our panties in a bind, shall we? This is a tournament just like any other tournament, except more wet and there's no sanctioned party. With this in mind, no one should look forward to this tournament any more than, say, White Smoke or Blow-It-Out-Your-Disc. We should approach this tournament with a great deal more composure than this sophomore appears capable of. We are a halfway decent team and if we "play our cards right," we just might have a chance of making it back to Chicago at the end of the weekend with our integrity and our buttholes intact.

Things to focus on:

(on the field...)

-catching with two hands

-throwing crisp but considerate passes

-not dropping the pull

(off the field...)

-drinking water

-giving fellow teammates constructive criticism

-not puking last night's champagne

I think that each of these tasks will take a great deal of focus to accomplish repeatedly, but I have the confidence that everyone except JMo will be able to do them all passably. We all have our weaknesses, and we need to cover for each other. When JMo is coughing up fizzy bile on Saturday morning, somebody is going to have to take his place as cutter/nudist. When Hupps briefly forgets he has a girlfriend, proceeds to hit on Qxchna, and gets taken away in a paddywagon for being a pedophile, someone is going to have to man up and sky some chumps. And when Jake finally grows a pair...well, let's not kid ourselves here folks.

Pre-Vegas Thoughts

My primary thought at the moment is how much of a bitch Baby is.

After that however, I have, as I'm sure all of you have as well, been spending a lot of time thinking about Vegas these past few days, hell, these past few weeks. I haven't done most of my work for this week, not because I couldn't but because I haven't wanted to, haven't cared, haven't been that worried about school when ultimate is occupying so much of my consciousness.

I think this focus and attentiveness is good. It feeds desire to win. It makes me think that we are a better team than we are, and if we think we are a better team, we push ourselves and expect ourselves to play like a better team. And FUCK, I think we should be a better team.

However, don't let the excitement about Vegas build it up into something it is not. This is our first tournament of the year. We are all still adapting to new positions, new teammates, new genders (in Craig's case). I can't wait to get out on that field and play, but it would be unreasonable for me not to expect to be rusty. Coming off a long injury and only a week being back, I want to do everything I can, knowing that I am not in the physical shape that I would like to be in. I hope everyone's approach is the same. We want to play the best ultimate and be the best team that we can be, but don't get down during or after this tournament.

Come Sectionals; Come Regionals; We will be ready.

Fuckin' Sweet.

-Jake

We're back!

Hey Cyberspace.

Jake here. Craig and I have decided to rejuvenate the previously defunct Junk blog as a way to document/chronicle/mock our upcoming season. Look forward to many posts concerning Ultimate, fun times, mediocre times, crappy times, Medieval Times, Frisbitch, the Chweidman, Seattle sockjobs, murky jerkys, BANK, and other oddities. also TOTE.

So take the metaphorical crayon out of your hypothetical brain and join us for the ride.

Vegas,
Jake