Tournament Time

The time is here, it has come for the 9th annual USA HOCKEY Disabled Festival.

But here I sit at home. No packed bags. No final check on equipment. Nobody from the Austin Blades are  going.

Pretty sad.

After joining forces with counterparts in Houston last year and winning 3rd place, one would believe that our team would re-group and aim for gold this year.

It never happened.

The idea was actually discussed at a team meeting before the 2012-13 season even began. A meeting that had no leadership in attendance and the ones really doing any of the talking were the leaders ON the team.

After a unanimous vote to NOT attempt to use funds or even raise them as a team to go to this tournament, it was very painful and disgusting to me to hear individual players talk among themselves after the meeting stating a desire to still try to go to Philadelphia.

It made no sense. Why in the world vote NO when your heart is saying YES?

Houston had already made up their minds that they were going to strive to go and that meant doing anything that they could to raise the money.

I believe there were several factors involved for the Austin Blades.

For one, it was estimated that each individual player would have to come up with $2,000 a piece in order to take care of transportation, lodging, and everything else that would be involved in going to Philadelphia. I think that each of the Austin players defeated themselves in believing that they would never be able to come up with that kind of cash. Never in a million years.

Upon that hearing that assumed magic number… each player immediately gave up.

Also, two of our ice rinks were stripped and torn away from us as the ice rink was sold. Leaving us with only one sheet of ice. And that sheet of ice was to accommodate for everything from hockey to skating lessons to figure skating. The sledge hockey team was seemingly thrown into this mix and we’ve not been able to have access to a full sheet of ice during any time that we have had practices.

At the beginning of the season, there was a series of bake sales that took place. With me taking care of my niece so that my sister could at least go to work once a week, I never participated in those bake sales. The scheduling of them was just not convenient for me to attend. And it pissed off the entire team that I was never there. They never quite understood.

There was but a few bake sales and then that disappeared. I suspect that the money that was earned from all of them went towards buying ice time for practices. But that’s information never willing to be confirmed. It would however stand to reason.

Times since then have been very few and far between that the Austin Blades have been on the ice, for any reason at all.

Meanwhile, Houston has been going at full force.

I did make a personal attempt to raise the money for MYSELF to be able to go. But out of the estimated guess of $2,000 that I needed, I was only able to raise $260. The link to the website was even on the Blogroll. Still is. But that’s all I was able to receive.

I found the lack of inspiration and willingness to sacrifice to make it to Philadelphia by the team lacking and pathetic. There’s no drive whatsoever! Only fear and self-intimidation.

This entire season I have been struggling in the back of my mind of whether or not to actually quit the team. But using that as a threat isn’t the point. The point is that the team seems to be slipping back into a comfort zone of doing seemingly nothing to go forward or get ahead. And that really kills my personal dreams and goals of participating in this exciting sport.

I know that Houston would welcome me with open arms if I end up there. They have always been inviting the Austin Blades to join them for a practice or two. Even challenging us to friendly competition…. going as far as to pay for gas and hotel. But the Austin Blades did nothing. It wasn’t even discussed as a team.

See what I mean by lacking??

Sledge hockey to me is not a hobby. Its not just something to do in order to get me out of the house for a few hours a week. It is a passion, a heartfelt interest. I’m driven by the idea of playing. It took more than three seasons to even get jerseys! Or something that would even resemble us as a sports team. And that was only done because I had a fire under me to push, push, push.

So much for the Austin Blades I suppose.

The team going from Houston is playing under the team name of Texas Stars. Which ironically is the same name of the semi-professional hockey farm team nearby. The Austin Blades will be playing on their ice after they play a full game later this weekend. But I seriously doubt anyone will be sticking around to watch us play. We tried that when our team had it together and we went to Houston for the first time. Over 9,000 people in the stands and nobody stayed behind to watch.

But I will be hoping and praying that Texas Stars do well this year in Philadelphia. The teams in that pool are many so there will only be two games played before they start a semi-final round, going by points. They must win five games outright to bring home the gold!

I noticed that their second match is against G.L.A.S.A., the same team that ruined us last year. I hope for some athletic vengeance on the ice. Games can be watched online at fasthockey.com, but they are not free! I think its something like $7.99 per credit. And of course if you buy more credits, the price goes lower per credit.

I am hoping for the gold. And at the same time, I know that deep down I will be totally miserable about it…. KNOWING that members of the Austin Blades, including myself, could have been a part of it.

So I will wear my green and black this week. And then I’ll be on the ice this coming weekend in our Austin Blades jersey doing my best to represent.

Speculation and rumor has it that the tenth annual tournament will be in Florida. NOW is the time to start planning for it, for those of us who didn’t go to Philadelphia. I’m going to be busting some serious ass to raise enough funds for that to happen. Even if the rumors are wrong, I will do what I can to get there and it doesn’t really matter where its located. Just as long as I AM THERE!!!!

 

 

Non Thoughtful Nincompoop

“Guilt: the gift that keeps on giving.”~Erma Bombeck

Now the entire world is done talking about the Mayans, we press on closer and closer to Christmas Day. It will be here before we know it!

With that said, today was the Christmas party for the complex that I live at. I must say that today is probably the most memorable party yet.

It was the first time that I had ever eaten chocolate covered potato chips. It was also the first time that I had cream cheese in soy sauce and sesame seeds.

However it was the gift exchange that basically takes the plate of Christmas cookies that you intend on leaving out on Christmas Eve, and throws them all into the sink before shoving them down the garbage disposal.

The gift exchange is not an activity that participated by everyone who attends. But a large number of people do. The idea is that you give a gift before receiving one. Plain and simple. And there’s even a cap of $10 for reach gift. No gifts to be purchased more than that.

So then today after some interesting snack foods and some unusual “caroling” if you will, the gift exchange began.

Each person taking their time to open things before the next person got up to make their selection for a gift.

The rest of this story is something that I couldn’t make up even if I tried:

It wasn’t enough to be greedy this past Wednesday as it was their monthly acts of greed during Food Pantry distribution, but now we have the desperate to do anything to take part in the gift exchange.

The neighbor sitting next to me was called up to pick a gift and when she sat down and opened it up, she found a woman’s wallet inside.

ONE USED WOMAN’S WALLET. Complete with wear & tear.

Now I am given to understand that there is either a tradition or superstition that if you are giving a wallet as a gift, that you leave some small amount of cash inside of it. I do not know if that is for luck or just the beginnings of actually having the purpose of a wallet.

This worn out wallet had no cash in it. But instead, was a photograph of someone’s brother in it. That someone being another neighbor.

The gifter literally just thought that they would empty out a wallet and throw it in a bag, and that would be sufficient enough to participate in the ritual of receiving something different and new in return.

So the person who received the wallet took the photograph over to the person and gave it back. Then the person was humiliated, NOT for the fact that she had been busted by someone who knows her well or by someone who is smart enough to realize that this is not a new gift, but rather the fact that her identity was revealed because she left that photograph inside the used wallet.

How lame, lazy, and cheap must one be? If the limit on a gift is $10 then why couldn’t that person have gone over to the corner store and just purchased some scratch off lottery tickets? Even if it was just one for $1.

And now I am understanding that some way, some how, that gifter miraculously has walked away from this party by receiving two gifts. That one, I am still scratching my head about.

People are strange.

Punked By Power Ball Posts

“It has always seemed strange to me… the things we admire in men, kindness and generosity, openness, honesty, understanding and feeling, are the concomitants of failure in our system. And those traits we detest, sharpness, greed, acquisitiveness, meanness, egotism and self-interest, are the traits of success. And while men admire the quality of the first they love the produce of the second. “~ John Steinbeck

Well, I suppose I wouldn’t be thorough if I only picked on Mega Millions and not picked on Power Ball.

The half billion drawing has already happened. For those people that I’ve read on Facebook about their plans to retire, get laid, go on a permanent vacation, or a huge Christmas shopping spree have already followed up with their disgust that they will be returning back to their place of work in the morning.

When odds are 1 in 175,000,000 — what did they honestly expect? Odds of being struck by lightning are 1 in 5,000. And I don’t think there’s anyone out there lucky enough to have been struck by lightning 35 times in their life and be able to defeat those odds to win the Power Ball as well.

But since I already went off on a tangent about the lottery back in late March, this blog post is more about the foolery of people and their brainy ideas on Facebook to “SHARE” the winnings….. IF their numbers won. 

Pretty much its already sketchy because the numbers HAVE to win.

Have you seen this??????

If you are on Facebook, you probably have seen either some television or radio station offering to share the big prize if you “LIKE” and/or “SHARE” that particular post. It was the same way in March with Mega Millions.

This particular post that was floating around was from a local FOX television station from someplace. When I looked at it, you had to “LIKE” and “SHARE” before the drawing. It had an insane amount of people going for it. And even after the drawing, the number of “LIKES” and “SHARES” totaled almost 500,000.

The jackpot was just over $500 million. But hypothetically speaking if you were to take the lump sum to make sure that you can control the amount coming, after all of the taxes and what not, you’re only going to collect about $242.5 million.

So $242.5 million divided up by 500,000 people (and probably growing still) that is approximately $485 per person. And that’s IF they are successful in winning ALL numbers and they are honest about it by contacting everyone who participating in their scheme to seek out their mailing addresses.

Those who were too lazy to go out and buy their own lotto ticket and going in like a vampire on this idea, if they were legitimately contacted by the television or radio station, receive less than $500. And most likely would come in the form of  either a certified check or money order. 

Of course with the odds the way that they are, the more lottery tickets are purchased the better the odds are that someone is going to win. However on the other side of the coin the less likely that you will win.

Then I did see a lot of people asking on Facebook if  someone that they knew had won. But the obvious way of finding out whether or not a “friend” of yours on Facebook has actually won the entire Power Ball jackpot is that they will almost immediately disable their Facebook account mysteriously and disappear for about a year or two.

Or you can just wait to read about it in some online news article in the morning to find out as well. Most likely it will be like the Mega Millions in March, some group of people pooled their money and now they will be sharing their winnings.

Whether you played or not, I hope that you at least bought your OWN lottery tickets. Dambreaker and its Nation are seriously tired of seeing our own brains from rolling our eyes so much.