sir (dame?) mix-a-lot

bay area women's mixer last sat. or two saturdays ago, i guess.

50+ women on the stanford fields where i threw with tommy this summer
four teams: fury, zeitgeist, slackjaw and mayhem
tons of talent
killer weather
im apparently allergic to the grass in the far left corner of the field (i was lil miss sneezy for a while. real hot when youre trying to prove yourself but youre all drippy and stuffed up)
four 20 min drills, each run by a team, then two hours of pickup
so very out of shape
really need to buy a new knee brace (rsd, why couldnt you find me my lost one?? oh the abyss that is sarasota!)
got to play a little with melanie (woohoo! she's looking really good, too. she seems nervous about zG's whole team - tryout deal, but i really dont think she needs to worry.)
met some really cool girls, including my cousin yael's best friend from law school (who captained fury last year. yeah, seriously)
really really excited to be playing ultimate here.
and absolutely terrified at how this whole thing works here.

four teams. four tryout schedules. who knows how many spots there are, and a gazillion girls going out for them. it's intense / i need to get back in shape and start throwing. a lot. im excited, though, the women seem really friendly, and i think no matter where i end up, im going to have fun and learn a lot... we'll see what happens. missing the tryout tourney (DUI april 5thish) could hurt a lot. i guess it's nice to not have to panic about running between teams, but still, it hurts that they arent seeing me play. i think if i were here, id prob try to play mostly with zG and fury, and then a little with slackjaw. though i just met the girl running mayhem and she's awesome. ive heard so many good things about the mayhem leadership, it makes me wonder. it might be really nice to be part of something new, too... oh! and the other mayhem captain is an old isis player. ive heard lots of good things about her, too, but somehow we've never crossed paths...)

ive rambled for far too long.

a quick observation, though: it's incredible how diff the east and west coast are in terms of top / second teir teams. i feel like the difference between the best teams on the east coast (take backhoe for example. okay, maybe im thinking more of the mid atlantic here) and the not-so-good (you know, the ones that tell you no, you cant tryout and there's no more room for practice players, and then get bumped out the first two games of regionals while you proceed to go to nationals with the team that stomps them regularly...) is pretty huge, while out here, yeah, fury is incredible. but then, zG is a semis team, coming off just a year of existence. how sick is that? and then slackjaw, the third team, is full of a bunch of recent graduates who are really laid back and fun. they didnt make nationals, but theyre not so shabby either. played with them this past saturday at fool's west in santa cruz, and though we lost to them on the first day, they went on to beat downtown brown for the win on sunday. granted it was a fun tourney, but dtb = a gazillion squirrelly asians including some ridiculous fury / zG / safari players. and then, mayhem. being formed by an ex-fury player and a girl who took her coed team to win nationals their first year in existence.

i guess wherever i end up, ill be pretty happy. it's hard to handle the tryout process with finesse, esp bc i want to meet as many ppl as possible being new, but in the end, i just want to play ultimate competitively, and it like out here, there's a whole lotta that.