The summer after I graduated high school, I was at work (in a bookstore, of course), when a personal call came through for me. I thought the call odd, and answered it, to hear Jenn tell me Ben had died. He was on a plane that had crashed the previous day, wind shears, one survivor, not Ben. Telling me at work seemed smart: I walked into the bathroom, cried for a long while, cleaned up, then went back to work, moving as numbly as I could, just needing something, anything, to keep going.

Ben's funeral wasn't so much of a funeral, there was no body to view, as a memorial. I remember being seeming the only person there crying. I couldn't understand why no one else was crying. Half the people there, and not just the boys, didn't have any evidence of having cried at all. Ben's mom at one point mentioned the graduation gift that was still on Ben's bed, unopened.

No one was crying.

For some of us, it was our first introduction to death, and they weren't crying.

I was confused and even more upset.

Three days ago, we began receiving the emails that, oh, god, none of us ever want to receive.

"... becky brought pro into the hospital yesterday and it doesnt look like he will be leaving this time ..."

"... They have found that the disease has progressed more than they realised and he is not doing well. The doctors have estimated that he has about three days ..."

So, here I am, completely stymied, at a loss.

And crying.

This isn't even my pain, and I'm crying.

Crying, because here's the imminent loss of an amazing person. Someone who is quick with the joke, generous with his time, as intense as needed, and just amazing to boot. He's this amazing person, and he's dying and it isn't fair.

It isn't fair to Becky, who is a wonderful person. It isn't fair to his kids. It isn't fair that someone who is good dies of something as stupid as pancreatic cancer. It's their pain, and I can't stop crying.

I few months ago, I asked my mom to send me pictures of me as a child. I had read about a woman who, when she was frustrated and angry with herself, would pull out a picture of herself as a child and ask herself if she would be so angry with this child? We are our own worst critics, sure, but the negative self destructive aggression inward certainly doesn't help anyone.

And, oh boy, do we know how hard I can judge myself.

When writing up goals for the month yesterday, I suggested we write a goal for each other. Mom agreed, and wrote "meditate for 15 minutes daily AWAY FROM THE DOGS" on my card. Yeah, that was her emphasis. My mom - she's one smart cookie.

One of my goals for her was to send me those pictures. She does that, and I can cross that off one of my cards, too. Win-Win.

Well, she sent me them in spades.

I showed Kris a couple, and told him, "If you had seen this picture 10 years ago, maybe you'd have wanted kids." He gave me that little "believe what you want, woman" shrug, but I know my cuteness won him over. I mean, really, how can you be angry at this?

A funny thing happened today, while I was readying today's long winded post about something random that happened to me last night... I sidetracked myself and, as I do most days, googled for "kitt" A few weeks ago, I made it to page two (holy crap, that's awesome, page 2? WOW!), which had me so so so very excited.

Today, I found myself on page 1. I was so excited, I nearly peed my pants. Okay, right, I'm already ON page one for the search "old ladies pissing" because I keep pissing off old ladies, and page one for the search "sprint 8" (but you knew that, yay Andy!) and page one for "why did Rob Start have to die?", but, come on, none of them are quite the achievement as being on page one for "kitt".

I had Doyle confirm, and yep, I'm there.

I'm going to bask for these 10 minutes before the Google Dance happens, when the algorithm realizes the error of its ways and drops me back to page 5. Until then, OMG, I'm on page 1! WHOO!

"You like this shirt only because I'm not wearing any pants."

"I'll admit bias to that effect."

"Thought so."

"You are wearing boxers, though, which mitigates that bias somewhat."

"Somewhat."

There are nice ways to ask for help. And there are sucky ways to ask for help. This weekend, I have to say, I'm far less likely to want to help those who ask for help by first insulting me or the people I'm working with, before asking for something from me.

The thing is, most of us here at this event are here because we love the sport of ultimate. I didn't have to help keep the servers up and running. I didn't have to stay up until 2:30 am, risking a migraine and an awful day the next day, to fix the damn scroll bars so that you could visit the scores page on your iphone without calling the site a hater. I didn't have to tweet score updates. I didn't have to put the rosters under the videos, or add the pretty pictures.

I chose to do all those things. And I did all of this because it was what I wanted, and I was willing to give my time and put forth some effort to make it happen. Maybe it'll happen again next year by someone else, maybe it won't. But calling the site a hater, and that you'll go check out the site to find more problems and report them back, doesn't really inspire me to help you out there as volunteer work.

Yeah, you get more flies with honey. Though I have to admit, I'm not particularly interested in gathering more flies, I have to say the honey part is right on.

Next time you want help from me, don't ask me if I fail whale much. If you do, I'll just block you from viewing my updates. Don't state the server wasn't ready because your computer is broken, I will call you out on it.

It's easy to understand: be rude to me, stop receiving the fruits of my efforts.