Team America: Week 6 Report

Team America plays in the upper intermediate indoor volleyball league for the Chicago Sports and Social Club every Tuesday night.

Another week and another character building experience. On the bright side, at least Jim and Ali didn't fight on court...they left that to the other couple. Thankfully all was patched up prior to the end of the night.

Now, even though we lost the match three games to none there were highlights. So allow me to break these down by player:

Jim - I'm just going to call you wall crawler from now on. Back to back scrambling plays on the wall, one where you pulled a Jackie Chan and jumped off it? Love it.

Ali - Holy crap, have your floor burns healed yet? Thank God you threw your self all over the place to pick up digs, because I know I wasn't going to get to them.

Stroh - Where the hell did that hitting display come from? And a good back row set to the strong side hitter?

Steve - Ok, so I know you're disappointed you didn't convert more of the sets that came your way, but you did put some impressive ones down.

Sarah, Kristen, and me - Good job setting guys. The decisions to put the ball over on two instead of the set were almost all good ones. You also did a good job adjusting to the guy in the grey shirt dinking balls over on two.

Matt and Gail - Where the hell are you?

That being said, we have a bye week this week and we're back in action for the last week of the regular season next Tuesday. Our opponents, Hank Scorpio, sit at 8-10 one spot directly in front of us. The bad thing is, even by taking all three games we can't move up in the rankings. The good thing is, even if we lose all three games we probably won't move down in the rankings because Set Shorty is more than likely to lose their set as well.

The New Hotness

First off, yes I know, I usually would have a Team America update here to cover the last game, but I couldn’t in good conscience have three straight volleyball entries. So, if you’re one of my loyal readers, and are jonesing for some vball, I’ll have that post up tomorrow.

On a more pleasant note, I would like to introduce the newest member of the family, my brand new 60 GB black iPod, henceforth to be known as “The New Hotness.” This is to distinguish it from the “Old and busted” Crackpod. You can read more of its bustedness, but long story short it had a dent in the back, the harddrive wouldn’t spin, and that’s not covered by the warranty.

Fortunately, Apple does run what it calls an “iPod recycling program” that gives you 10% off the purchase of a new iPod when you recycle an old iPod, iPod mini or an iPod nano. So, figuring I would maximize the amount I got back from my original, I went ahead and dropped my hard earned dollars to buy the biggest pod available. Also, to avoid the fate of the previous pod, I also purchased the Agent 18 Shield and the Power Support Crystal Film set. Overkill? Probably, but after dropping nearly $400 on The New Hotness I wanted it to last a little longer than its predecessor.

I am again a full fledged citizen of the iPod nation, once more commuting with the Cadillac of portable audio equipment. After giving up my pod for Lent, and then waiting another month to see if anything new was coming out for Apple’s anniversary, I am glad to be back among white headphone wearing hordes. Clare asked if I had any observations from my self imposed exile. After thinking about it I do have a few brief ones.

1. Everyone has an iPod. Not having mine made me realize how ubiquitous the little, white, mp3-that-could had become.
2. There are a lot of panhandlers in Chicago. I think all that time with headphones on (four years if you include the two previous mp3 players I had) had made me obvlivious to all but a fraction of the panhandlers in the Loop.
3. One in every 5 street musician has talent. I saw an oboeist (oboist? oboest? cantaloupe?) and a french horn player at the Washington Red Line stop, and they were good. There was also a saxophonist on Michigan and Randolph that was doing a decent Coltrane impersonation. Don't get me started on all the amped up singers and guitar players that made my commute hell the past few months, I don't even want to think about it.
4. Songs got stuck in my head a lot easier. I had nothing to cleanse the palate nor at times did I have the opportunity to hear a song to its completion. This explains why Rihanna's "S.O.S." got stuck in my head for about a week straight.
5. The protective bubble was intact. At first I thought I would feel somewhat naked due to no longer having my pod to shut the world out. Oddly enough, the fact that everyone else was using one meant that I was more of a bubble wrapped commuter. There were times though, where I was left out on an island with the occasional loud talker, whether it be via cell or live conversations. It was all I could do to not jump over other passengers and clamp someone's mouth shut.
   

Well, that's about it. The Crackpod is no more, all hail The New Hotness.