CMUA Indoor Ultimate 101 - Introductory Indoor

This is an introductory post, intended for those unfamiliar with the sport of ultimate and, more specifically, the sport of CMUA Indoor Ultimate. It is considered a prerequisite for later study in the more advanced post (CMUA Indoor Ultimate 405 - Advanced Indoor Theory). Students of this post with gain an understanding of the rules of CMUA Indoor Ultimate and the basics of attending and playing.

The Central Maryland Ultimate Association (CMUA) runs a winter league at Landsdowne High School. It's a indoor league played in a fairly small gymnasium. It's similar to real ultimate in that you need to advance the disc to the endzone by passing it from player to player. However, the stall count begins at 6 rather than 1 and the endzone is a mere 5 yards deep. There is also no stoppage of play or change of possession when a point is scored. The field reverses on a score and the team that scores begins attacking the other endzone, this is referred to as "make-it, take-it" as in pick-up basketball. If the disc lands out of bounds, it is put in play at the nearest boundary, including the back of the endzone (unlike regular ultimate).

There are also basketball hoops obstructing some of the airspace in and around the field. You have the standard two hoops for the regulation high school court running the length of the gym. These objects are considered in-bounds. Any disc striking these objects is still in play and can be received by the offense. There are four hoops for the smaller courts running the width of the gym, two of these can be hit with a throw that bends out of bounds. These hoops are out of bounds and a disc striking these hoops (including the net) becomes out of bounds. Finally, any throw striking the ceiling or lights is immediately considered out of bounds.

Each team consists of five players of either gender. Often, some effort is made to make gender ratios, but it is not necessarily required.

I believe that this concludes the background post. Congratulations, you are now ready to consider further posts on Advanced Indoor Theory.

This post doesn't have very many links, so here's a link to an Indoor Ultimate Frisbee Tournament in Bratislava, Slovakia.

You know what's a good movie?

Match Point.

You may remember it as the movie with Scarlett Johansson, Emily Mortimer, and Jonathan Rhys Meyers. Or you may have heard that Woody Allen wrote and directed the movie. Don't let this fool you, just because the cast is incredibly attractive and Scarlett Johansson is the most famous actor and Woody Allen has recently been known for directing absolute crap, do not for a minute think that this movie is not going to blow you away.

I can't tell you what it's about. I know that this may not be the best way to sell a movie, but it is necessary. The last thing I want to do is give away the movie, it has a twist to it that really blew me away the first time I saw it. I'm watching it on DVD now and I think I appreciate everything a lot more now that I know where it's all going.

If you really like a great drama and spectacular film making, go rent or buy this movie at your first opportunity. Just don't go reading any reviews that might spoil the plot for you.

Carbonated Soft Drinks

"Coke Rewards" is one of those customer loyalty programs that Coca-Cola runs to try to get people to drink more soda. Basically, if you drink a 20 oz. soda or by a 12-pack of Coke or Diet Coke they give you a code to enter into their website to earn points. Eventually you can redeem points for merchandise (I estimate that if I did this for the next 20 years, I could get an X-Box).

Anyway, recently I was asked to take a survey for them. I think it rates at least a 6 out of 10 on the unitentional comedy scale. Here are some questions (please rate from 1 to 5 with 1 = "strongly disagree" and 5 = "strongly agree"):

"Within the last six months I have spoken to a lot of people about carbonated soft drinks"
- Ok, seems like a reasonable question. I haven't, but maybe some people who drink more soda have had such conversations.

"I often speak about carbonated soft drinks with my friends or family."
- That could be considered distinct from the first question, if you are a person who has deep, involved conversations about soda with strangers on the street.

"When I speak about carbonated soft drinks with my friends and family I usually give them a lot of information."
- Huh? Like calorie content? The price of a twelve pack at the local Shopper's? (Answer: $3.50)

"My friends and family would probably consider me a good source of advice for carbonated soft drinks."
- Come on, has this ever really happened to someone? Have you ever had a conversation start out, "Well, son, I think you're old enough now that you've probably started to notice soft drinks, would you like some advice?"

"During a conversation about carbonatd soft drinks, it is very probable that I would convince my friends and family about my ideas."
- You know what Jim? You're right, I had never really thought about the difference between Coke Zero and Diet Coke before, your theories on the overall carbonated soft drink experience have really opened my eyes. I don't know what I'd do without a brother-in-law who was so knowledgeable about carbonated soft drinks.

Back in the Good ol' USA!

So, I have just returned from a 10-day vacation in China. Just like any other American who visits Asia for the first time, especially China, I'm pretty overwhelmed with things to say about it. Overall, pretty cool place; although I recommend traveling before November 15th (when they turn on the heat and the air pollution becomes unbelievable...more on that later).

I'll probably post some more of my thoughts over the next few days, for now:

See those little square things along the top of that mountain ridge? That's part of the Great Wall (at Simatai). I mean, seriously, were you really that concerned that someone is going to move an invading army across that mountain? Are you insane?

Roger Dodger

Right now, as I speak, I am watching about the most terrible movie I've seen in a long, long time. It's called, you guessed it, Roger Dodger. It's about a wannabe player in New York City whose 16-year-old nephew shows up unannounced. The uncle then proceeds to try to teach the kid about how to pick up a woman. Unfortunately, his uncle is a prick and really doesn't know how to pick up a woman.

This had made for some great quotes, including:

"You have to make sex a PRIORITY in your mind"

"you know what made Michael Jordan great? he paced himself, he always had something left for winning time"

"- just because you're not having sex doesn't mean the rest of us are staying at home playing cribbage! ... - what's cribbage?"

"And I don't want to see you talking to any guys, that's a rally killer"

Really, if you can avoid it, don't watch this movie. Find something better to do with your evening, like cribbage.

Fun with the Democratic Process

So today has certainly been the most exciting mid-term election that I can remember. Then again, I don't have a very long memory, especially for things that I spend most of my time hating (like politics). It seems like O'Malley is going become governor. I'm still not sure how I feel about that. Without a doubt I'll be feeling lighter in my wallet, I can't imagine O'Malley passing up the opportunity to increase Maryland's tax burden. On the other hand, I can't really come up with anything I like about Ehrlich. I guess that if O'Malley does become governor, then something good could come of it: Sheila Dixon will become Baltimore City mayor. Not that I know anything about her, but she apparently she might support an ban on indoor smoking in Baltimore City. I really enjoy places where people don't smoke, so I think I would enjoy more of Baltimore City in that case.

Anyway, voting is always fun. The best part being that I can stop hearing about politics and political strategy all the damn time of WYPR. I really wish NPR would cover politics less and anything else instead. The worst part is that there's never any talk of the issues, it's all talk about how the political parties are using popular opinion on current issues to try to eke out some minuscule advantage over the other party.

You know what I think is a strange race? Maryland's 5th House District, where there is a Democratic candidate and a Green Party Candidate, but no Republican. I suppose you could write-in the Constitution Party candidate, but that seems even crazier than the Green Party. Apparently, the Republicans didn't bother because the incumbent is a 25-year incumbent, but I think it's kind of silly that the Green Party candidate is pulling 17% of the vote (with 57% of the precincts reporting).

On computerized voting: it worked pretty well for me. Obviously, I've grown up with technology, but it was really a piece of cake. So much for the news media giving us an accurate warning for technology leading to the collapse of society...looks like they're 0 for 2 if you count Y2K. I don't even want to count all the times they've warned us of the impending near-collapse of society due to identity theft, illegal music downloading, and social networking websites. Oh, and no children have started a nuclear war by accident yet either.

Rambling Thoughts on Music

What, you might ask, am I doing publishing an occasional blog for more or less two months without recommending a music album? Do I not believe that my music tastes are above average and that I have a special insight into the sort of music you ought to own?

Fear not, I am prepared to recommend a new album to you: Eyes Open from Snow Patrol.

If you visit their webpage, you're likely to notice something that I've just discovered: those dudes really, really look like a bunch of guys from England. The haircuts, the pasty white complexions, even the jackets. It's pretty uncanny (ok, so they're actually from Ireland, but how am I supposed to know about Irish haircuts?).

Anyway, you may remember Snow Patrol from their unbelievably good song "Chocolate" from a couple years ago (off of the album Final Straw). I'm sure that not everyone agrees with this characterization, many people liked "Run" better, but what's the point of having a soap box if you don't use it?

The point of this entry, however, is that if you haven't heard the album Eyes Open, then you should give it a chance. It may not be as good as Final Straw, but then again, I may be swayed by the existence of the song "Chocolate." I believe that was an example of the band playing above their level. A statistical anomaly.

I think this happens a lot to bands; for example, The Postal Service. Their original album, Give Up, is unbelievable. It is probably in my top few favorite albums. But I hope and pray that they don't release more material. It's just going to depress me. Clearly, it can be no better than Give Up...and I believe it could be a lot worse. Look at it this way, have you listened to Death Cab for Cutie (Ben Gibbard's band)? It's just a disappointing experience if you've listened to The Postal Service. They really need to quit while their ahead before they release another album where they try to rekindle the magic and their wikipedia article starts talking about how they used to be good.

Oddly enough, it seems that I've set out to write a quick recommendation of Eyes Open and completely failed to give you a good reason to buy the album. So here you go: I recommend that you check out the song "Set the Fire to the Third Bar." It's a spooky, haunting duet featuring Martha Wainwright. Be prepared to dislike it the first 2 to 5 times you hear it, but after that, you're going to have to buy the CD (or download it from iTunes).

Another Reason to Hate Fraternities

If you live in Baltimore, it's pretty much impossible to have missed the news of a party at a Johns Hopkins fraternity (Sigma Chi) that had pretty offensive racial stereotypes. Apparently JHU has suspended the fraternity now.

Today a coworker asked me about my opinion on the issue because JHU is my alma mater. Here's what I told him:

It doesn't surprise me a bit that something like this could happen at Hopkins. It's not that the students are bad people, it's that they have absolutely no communication with the local community in general. Why? They're all middle to upper-middle class kids from the suburbs thrust into a lower-middle class to low class neighborhood. Then you add to it that Baltimore is an incredibly dangerous city and these kids have never lived in a city before…students are very wary of any part of town that is at all working-class or poor. So you have a situation where the prevailing local culture is very different from the culture that the students grew up in. So occasionally someone will suggest having a party themed after local culture. The problem is that Baltimore (and the area near Hopkins) is predominantly African-American. So when they set out to lampoon local culture, it ends up having very racial overtones.

Rereading it now, I still think that it's the best description I've come up with yet to describe the interaction between JHU and Baltimore. I can't say that it's the first time I've heard of a "ghetto" themed party at JHU. I had some friends once propose such a party, but when I thought about it I told them "Hey, I know you don't mean it, but that party could come off with a pretty racist vibe." They thought about it, then changed the party theme to "crazy hat" party.

My argument is that sometimes the students don't realize the harm they might be doing. Now, please note that I do not believe that this fraternity made an innocent mistake. I am describing the subtly racist attitude that I have noticed among many JHU undergraduates and where I believe it originates.

It really blows my mind that you had a bunch of students plan this party and no one stepped up and said "Hey guys, this might be a bad idea." Although, it's not all that surprising when you consider that this was a fraternity party. Fraternities act as positive feedback mechanisms for insensitivity. Which is probably why that party went from accidentally having racial overtones to being nothing but negative stereotypes of African Americans.

So what do I think about having the university ban this fraternity? Go for it. However, I would much prefer that JHU (and other universities) revise their policies of supporting Greek life. Fraternities and, to a lesser extent, sororities simply do not add value to the collegiate experience. Modern fraternities exist to promote underage drinking and promulgate misogynistic behavior. Ban them all and watch your community relations improve.

Surprise!

Well, just to taunt me for last night, in the news today we learn that Baltimore is the 12th most dangerous city in America.

The police commissioner was on the television news saying that they "Know what the problem is and what's driving these statistics and are working to reduce them." Unfortunately, despite the fact that they know what the problems are, they aren't sharing that knowledge with the general public. This comes despite the fact that the police commissioner also stated that the police "Know what they needed to do." A cynical person might be suspicious of these claims without some sort of evidence to back it up.

Fuck Baltimore

Well, I suppose that it was bound to happen sooner or later. I live in Baltimore. I've lived here for almost six years. Tonight I was held up at gunpoint for the first time. Not in my neighborhood, but near an area where I used to live (West Side of Downtown).

It was just past midnight (Sunday night). My roommates and I were leaving a friend's birthday party. We are just reaching the car (parked in front of 701 W. Pratt St.), one guy is opening it up. I see a guy on a bike riding along on the sidewalk. Right as I am opening the door to the car, he pulls up, leans his bike against the wall and starts to reach into his back waistband. As soon as I saw him reaching into his back waistband I was like "Oh fuck, are you serious?" Yeah, it was a gun. Revolver. Small caliber, possibly even .22 caliber. I had my wallet out in a flash. All he wanted was cash, thankfully. I had about $24. My one roommate had about $40. My other roommate was in the car and didn't at first realize what was going on. The guy actually pointed the gun at him and yelled at him to turn the car off. He only had $6 in cash. The guy was pretty pissed about this, but my roommate in the car threw out the wallet, so the guy could see that he wasn't hiding anything. He patted me down (I offered my change and cell phone) and my other roommate who was outside the car. Then he told us to "roll out" and got back on his bike.

It sucks, I've definitely been in that situation a hundred times before and will probably be in it many times more. It's nighttime, there's an African-American man in dark clothing (in this case a hood) approaching (in this case on bicycle). It flashes through your mind "should I be concerned?" and then you think "no, you're being paranoid and maybe racist." Then, this time, he fucking pulls a gun on you and takes your money.

I think that might actually be the last straw for me. Next summer I'm probably moving. It will be time to reevaluate city living versus the suburbs. I have to be honest, I never want this to happen to me again. I absolutely want to do everything in my power to make sure this never happens to my girlfriend or anyone important to me. If I have to move to the suburbs to make that happen, then I suppose it's a small price to pay.

PS - Baltimore Police were very professional about it. Although they did spend a little time, not quite out of ear shot, trying to decide if they could stick this one on another jurisdiction.

Business Traveling

Recently I've noticed a pattern in my behavior; I keep traveling to Connecticut. I think I need some sort of frequent Connecticut card. So for every time I travel to Connecticut, I'd get some number of points. After I reached a large number of points, I could trade them in for some sort of Connecticut reward or Connecticut gift certificate.

My Favorite Character is Earl

Recently I rented Disc 1 of Season 1 of My Name is Earl from Blockbuster*. It's rekindled my love for that show. For the uninitiated, I'll give a quick overview. You start with a chronic theif and all-around ne'er-do-well named Earl. Suddenly he realizes that he has to start over and make everything right in his life to repair his karma, a concept introduced to him by Carson Daly. So obviously, he writes down all the bad things he has done and starts to set them right (including such feats as "Faked my own death to avoid breaking up with a girl").

What really makes the show great is even as they lampoon low-class America, they do it with love. Earl and his even more simple brother Randy live out of a seedy motel, where they make friends with the maid, Catalina (who, of course, has dubious immigration status). Earl's scheming ex-wife Joy lives in a trailer with Darnell (AKA "crabman" from the crabshack).

I had a friend from high school who, after graduation, started doing construction. For awhile he was living out of a motel and dressed strikingly similar to Earl. He drank at a bar like the crabshack. He drove around in an old car. He certainly didn't steal, but he definitely inhabited a world similar to Earl's.

I suppose that's one of the reasons why I like "My Name is Earl." It's a funny show, absolutely, but it also reminds me of my friend. He could have easily become a successful businessman or gone into almost any line of work. However, he was content with his life, he didn't want the stress of running his own business or a changing jobs. It's impressive that you can have a major network comedy based around a guy that lives out of a seedy motel without feeling like we're supposed to look down on people in that circustance. I would think that it'd be tough for someone in the position to create a TV show to understand someone in the position to drive an El Camino and eat vending machine donuts for breakfast. Bravo Greg Garcia (and, of course, the entire cast is excellent).

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* Quick aside: How did we survive before Blockbuster.com? Or Netflix, since they're essentially the same thing. My roommates and I pay $18 per month and in return, I have a reason to live another day (namely, a new DVD of The Wire might come in the mail).

Prosper.com Starts Rating Groups

Prosper.com has finally started rating their borrowing groups! Up until this point, I'd pretty much viewed the groups as useless - being the member of a group seemed offer no advantage to a borrower. For anyone that doesn't know, groups receive a small portion of each payment that a borrower makes. The group leader either keeps that small portion (ideally to compensate for the amount of time they spend screening new members and keeping track of current loans) or shares it with the group. What this amounts to is a higher effective interest rate for the borrower.

Now that Prosper is rating groups, being the member of a group actually adds some information that is not available from a regular credit report. Basically, ratings are based on a comparison of the group's default rate against Experian historical default rates. Groups are rated from 1 to 5 stars, more stars = fewer defaults. This extra information might justify the extra expense of being a group member (I'm still not convinced about it). However, I do have to admit, I'm certainly going to be browsing the established, 5-star groups for my next loan.

Comcast Ruins My Friday Afternoon

How, you might ask, can Comcast frustrate you on a Friday afternoon when you are not even a Comcast customer? It might seem natural to assume that poor customer service can only happen to you if you are a customer, it seems Comcast has reached a new level. Like a gangster spraying bullets from an automatic weapon, Comcast has hit an innocent bystander with their terrible customer relations.

This evening I had nearly completed my evening commute. I pulled into the alley behind my house to park my car, when lo and behold, a Comcast Authorized Contractor!



I'm going to take a moment and make some observations here:

1. This alley is a one-way street
2. There a bunch of empty parking spaces behind
   a) the house they are servicing
   b) other nearby houses
3. The contractor is actually getting something out of the car right now
4. It would take surprisingly little effort to move that vehicle and let me pass

Guess what the Comcast Authorized Contractor decided to do? How about insist that I back out of the alley, drive around the block, then drive back up the alley (the wrong direction on a one-way street) to reach my parking space. In his defense, he did offer to let me wait 15 minutes for him to finish his work, then he would move the car.

Has Comcast already forgotten about that guy that made a YouTube video of a Comcast technician falling asleep on his couch? I would have thought that Comcast would have made the point to their technicians and contractors that Comcast is judged by their behavior. I guess I would have been wrong.

Support Public Radio

Today was the last day of the local NPR station's fall pledge drive. I've finally joined WYPR, I suppose it's the responsible thing to do since I listen so frequently. Also, the member card that will get you 2-for-1 meals at Baltimore restaurants didn't hurt.

Best Local Bar

Idlehour.

Located at the corner of Fort Ave. and William St.

If you don't think that a bar with music that is not so loud as to preclude conversation and without television is a good idea, then you should go to MaGerk's instead. Also, they have original art for sale. Oh, and if that weren't enough, they have Resurrection (from Brewer's Art) on tap.

Go there.

Dangerously Delicious Pies

There's been a recent addition to my neighborhood that I absolutely have to support: Dangerously Delicious Pies. They are such a recent addition, in fact, that they do not even list their current location on their website.

Why do I support such an institution in Federal Hill?

1. Their pies are ridiculously good
2. Their coffee is reasonably priced and pretty good
3. The proprietor started making pies when "rock and roll wasn't paying the bills anymore"
4. The combination of items 1 thru 3 IN ONE STORE.

One thing that I've always found annoying about Federal Hill is that there is no coffee shop open after 8 PM. No place where you can go sit and read The City Paper and relax with a cup of coffee. Finally, someone opens a place to fill that void...and it happens to be a tattoo-ed semi-retired rock-and-roll drummer who bakes pies. Isn't that the American dream?

Anyway, if you live in the area, you should give them a try. Apparently there's some sort of grand opening party this Saturday with pie and rock and roll. The store is located near Blue Agave on Light Street...I guess that makes it the 1000 block of Light Street.

The REAL Reason I Got a Blog

Today I saw a front-page article in the Wall Street Journal (yeah, I suppose that ought to be a link or something...but I only get the paper version, I'm not subscribed to the website) about how oil has fallen below $64 per barrel. You won't believe it, but I totally called this. In early August, when oil went above $75 per barrel, I said "That's it, oil has peaked, and it's going to fall. In six months all the news articles will be about how oil is so cheap." Look, it's starting already!

I told you that you wouldn't believe me.

That's why I've got a blog: so that next time, when you don't believe me, I can link you back to the original post where I made my prediction.

Prosper.com Posting Marketplace Performance

All right, time to get this blog rolling.

One of the things that I've been interested in over the last few months is Prosper.com, an online marketplace for unsecured loans. Recently they have begun publishing performance data on their loans.

I haven't really had a chance to compose much of a post about this topic, but I wanted to get this up for anyone who is interested. Honestly, that's one of the best parts of Prosper, they are collecting tons of data on how unsecured personal loans perform. Normally this is proprietary information of a large company, but with Prosper, it's all made public because individuals are the lendors.

Intentions

I feel obligated to begin with a brief statement of what I intend this blog to be about. Mostly, I intend it to be about things that I find interesting that I believe others might find interesting as well. As you can see from the URL, I'm a yuppie and not afraid to admit it. I'm somewhat proud that I live in Baltimore and am helping to provide a tax base for the city. I purchase my goods and services from small, local retailers (well...as long as I feel that the atmosphere is worth the premium on cost...I'll buy almost anything I can at Wal-Mart). I try to be a good citizen. Along the way I probably cause gentrification and run up property values (hence the allusion in the blog description), but I figure that law-abiding, responsible citizens are the least of this city's problems.

Anyway, so yeah, from now on I'll post interesting things and pepper my sentences with links like any other good blog would.