As I'm sitting here near the end of my work day, I can see one of the silver medals won by Team USA at the 2001 World Games in Akita, Japan.

It's a lovely medal: big, hefty, detailed, shiny.

And silver.

I look at it and wonder about this year's Team USA. From the rumors I've heard and the stories told directly to me, I have to officially predict another shiny silver medal for the team I so desperately wanted to be on.

Team USA (that would be the self-proclaimed premier ultimate team of the United States) lost in the semi-finals at Potlatch two weekends ago. Given the personalities on the team, I guess I shouldn't be surprised:

From the coach of the team, on the UPA's site:

On Friday night most of Team USA gathered for a pre-tourney dinner and then continued on with some libations. Those of us still operating on east coast time—or those not fully willing to join the sub-group of our team known as “team evil”—went to sleep. Others (far more evil) stayed out until last call. The core of evil ended up hot-tubbing in the building where Kati Halmos lives. I don’t have the details on how Kati’s condo mates felt about having Alex Nord running the hallways at five A.M., but I am pretty sure the almighty’s name was soon invoked.

Emphasis mine.

Sure, the tournament was supposed to be a fun tournament, a chance to lighten up and play some fun ultimate.

But, they lost in the semi-finals to another American team.

They lost. In the semis.

As ambassadors of my sport, for my country, this freaking sucks. You are supposed to be representatives for ultimate, not a bunch of over-confident, hung-over, undisciplined lushes.

That the team selected thinks drinking and hot-tubbing is more important than playing a tournament well is wrong. That even the coach thinks partying all night and getting drunk is okay and even encouraged, is wrong.

Potlatch was a tournament to practice, to learn how to play with the other players who, up until this point have probably been opponents, to finetune the offense, to learn where the weak points are on the team and how to minimize them. This isn't a tournament to get drunk every single freakin' night (read the rest of the coach's entry).

So here are my words to Team USA. $1 says you'll never hear them:

You suck.

Those words don't go out to all the members of the team. Those who went to bed early, played well, drank little, worked hard, and practiced diplomacy, I would say, "Thanks," and a big "Good luck! You, I'll be cheering for."

While at a Wild Oats today for lunch, I watched a woman at the salad bar spill the entire two foot pile of take-away containers. I was standing half way down the salad bar when a clatter pulled my attention to the end of the bar. I turned to look at the cacophany, and watched in suppressed amusement as the woman attempted to catch the falling containers, mostly by knocking over the next stack of containers.

As I wondered how embarassed she must be feeling, I noticed she was looking around furtively. "More than a little bit," I thought.

I finished filling up my salad container, dressing and all, and started filling up a second container for a coworker who, due to time constraints, was unable to pick up lunch for herself. At the end of the bar were the dressings. After pondering for a moment which dressing my coworker would like, I decided on the ranch dressing.

I'm never sure how much dressings separate, so I pretty much always shake them. I picked up the large container of ranch dressing and tightened the lid. You can never be too sure, you know. The container was fairly big, so I grabbed it with both hands, and started shaking.

After the first shake, I realized the viscosity of the ranch dressing was pretty high, so I put my whole body into this shake. I figured three really good shakes and it'll be well mixed.

One ...

Two ...

BLURP!

Turns out, the cap was a flip top, and not a screw on lid.

I had just sprayed ranch dressing all over the bar, the counter, my salad, my arms and my shoes.

I looked up to see the container lady smiling at me.

"It's the salad bar."

Heh. Yeah.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

Thrice damned mother fucker.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck!

3-3, I think.

Last week's instant karma was, "Give yourself freedom to fail." I managed to use this when I was playing at Potlatch this past weekend. It helped: both Jane and Mark independently told me they have never seen me play better than I played this weekend. I'm very happy to hear those words.

I used that mantra and two others to help me before the start of every game and the start of every point I played. I'm guessing it helped based on Mark and Jane's comments.

Before the second game on Saturday, which was also the second game of the tournament, at the end of the team warmups, someone (I think it was Kris) said, "Do whatever it takes to psych yourself up." I'm surprised I heard the words: they weren't said loudly. But, I took them to heart.

At the beginning of every point, as I stood on the line waiting for the pull, I gave myself the freedom to fail (fail to defend fully, fail to throw the perfect throw, fail to make the perfect catch). And then I did whatever it took to psych myself up, which meant deciding to play hard.

The difference between deciding to play hard and making no decision is a big deal. The team's energy helps in making that decision. If the team is excited to play hard, then playing harder is easier, but it still has to be an individual's (conscious or unconscious) decision to play harder. On the line, I chose to play harder.

Mid-Sunday, I added a third line to my mental chatter on the line, waiting for a pull. During a point, after a turnover, I was jogging back to the stack, when I heard Kris' voice from the sideline: "Run hard."

At the time I wasn't sure if he was talking directly to me, or the team as a whole, but I always seem to hear his voice over the rush of the game and the cacophany of the crowd. Run hard.

And I did.

I ran as hard as I could that possession. I ran as hard as I could that point. I ran as hard as I could that game.

And at the end of that game, after we had won, sitting tired and exhausted in the circle talking about the game and the day, Jane came up to me and said she had never seen me play so well. I had become, in her words, one of those wily veteran handler types.

Thank you, Jane. Those words mean so much to me.

We ended up ranked 16th at the beginning of the third day. Our first game of the day was against Team USA, who was ranked first for the tournament, having been ranked first for the whole tournament. We played scared. I dropped an easy disc thrown to me, but caused a turnover with an aggressive mark. We lost 15-7, handily beating the over/under betting score of 4.

Our next game was against Brass Monkey, who had spent most of the morning before the first game complaining they should be ranked higher than 9th. In as much as they lost the 8 vs 9 game first thing in the morning, I had to agree with the tournament organizers in their ranking.

Worse for them, we beat them by two points, to send them down into the 13-16 rankings, as we climbed up to the 9-12 rankings. The worst we could do was 12th. Hot Damn.

I continued to give myself the freedom to fail, do whatever I needed to do to psyche myself up, and run hard. I had a great time. Mischief finished 10th out of 100 teams. And I had the best tournament of my life.

Maybe there's something to this self-forgiveness: allowing myself the freedom to fail and discovering I can succeed.

Good lord, person, if you're in a meeting with a client, don't answer your cell phone, talk for 2 minutes, then tell your caller you're in a meeting can you talk to him later.

Just don't answer the phone in the first place.

Better yet, turn your phone to vibrate or off.

Answering the phone is incredibly disrespectful. Learn to respect the time of the people you're in the meeting with.

[Okay, sure, if it's an emergency, fine, but announce before the meeting starts that you're expecting an emergency call. Jerk.]