Where Have I Been? (part 1)

The Roys of Summer...

{42, 000 words
6/9 rough chapters almost done}

It's been too long, but then again it always has. One summer done, one chapter slowly churned out, and a lot of Ultimate Frisbee played.

I am trying to work my way back into the novel groove and my lack of employment certainly is helping. Still before I get too deep in all of that I want to post something here. It was a little big thing I wrote for my Ultimate team, ROY upon the completion of our 2009 campaign.

It was something I had seen done before and loved. A tournament recap. So I gave it a shot and have been told to publish it here. So without further ado, I gave you part 1 of 3, of my retelling of the 2009 Canadian Ultimate Championships in Winnipeg Manitoba as experienced by me and the White Tigers:

Come one, come all.

Sit down and get comfortable, for I am about to tell you all a tale of a grand and glorious adventure in what has to be the single most depressing place in the universe: Winnipeg.

A group of young men, brave stupid men, fought against this overwhellming blackness, and they survived... but at what price?

It begins with sunshine. Perfect weather had finally arrived to our fair city, after a summer of near endless rain and pain. So it was that only god, that robot in the sky, was laughing as those boys stepped aboard their planes to leave their sunny town, having no idea what was waiting for them.

They felt like the world was theirs for the taking, Winnipeg was just a city in a flatland with a funny name. "Winnipeg. Ha" they thought to themselves while sipping their inflight beverage. Meanwhile somewhere in Winnipeg another baby was eaten alive to fuel the Depressatron 3000, the only machine that can ensure suicidal urges to all those living within its emission radius. Our team of heros floated in their planes above the Deathtrapipeg... all except one.


The one who only GOD CAN JUDGE, J*****, laughed as he came home from the airport. He knew others would tease him about his 'booking mistake' but J***** had a plan. He felt the warmth of his home caress his soul as he thought about his unlucky teammates already slowly dying in the peg.


And he was right, but the boys didn't know it yet. Our heroes were still hopeful, they looked at the city through the goggles of naivety: Sure, Winnipeg airport was kind of small and stupid but whatever there was a rainbow and cool lightning outside!...Sure, our hotel was named after a cancer stick and the view from our windows was of sad sack of bricks but they had an unsupervised waterslide!... Sure, there was only ONE restaurant in the ENTIRE downtown core (not including the optical illusion that is robins/241pizza/suicide prevention hotline centre) , but it had total babes!

Ah the ignorance of youth.

The first day of Ultimate came and hope was still flying free. The weather was looking up, and we were about to throw down. What else could a young dude ask for?

And thus Roy entered the POOL OF 1000 DEATHS. More specifically it was three deaths, but it felt like an infinite number of torturous slayings. No need to go over the carnage here, all we need is the sound of one Coach's heart imploding into a Black Hole (TM) as our heros sat around and listened, all the while breathing in the Disgusting Haze that is 'nice' weather in the Shittypeg. Somewhere behind the trees the Tournament Director stroked his goatee and whispered under his breath: "OH GREAT DARK LORD the first stage is complete in your bidding. Winnipeg shall claim another batch of young fresh souls! AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!". And with a wave of his pitchfork he ensured that all Shuttle Buses back to the hotels would be five hours late and packed with stank.

There was no solace from the Great Prarie Darkness for our heros.They tried to escape to their usual fortress of solitude, the unsupervised pool and waterslide, but even this could not restore them. It should have been the time of their lives: hot tub, waterslide, splash sword, iron-rich traingle corn chips, but instead all they could feel was the sting in their eyes. They thought that sting was the chlorine, but no, it was the sting of WINNIPEG eating their tears.

The seond day of games was somehow worse. Satan had given the boys an early first game knowing full well that instead of playing he would make them sleep in the mud of the tournament tent as God threw down lightning and rain trying to destroy the one mistake he had made: Winnipeg.

When they finally did play, our heroes did something no one expected. They battled against the darkness. They won a game. It stopped raining. Satan was confused and began to worry. He even saw some Roy players at the end of the day walking around and.... smiling?!?!? Clearly he had not done enough. He had to come up with some new way to turn them into hollow shells of men.

He posted the sign as they waited for their Shuttle Bus:

!!!!ALL GAMES CANCELLED!!!

"Try smiling now ROY! AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. winnipeg"


Yet they did smile. At first they were sad. They were also mad, but they dealt with that shit and moved on. At this point it was just a matter of making it out that town alive. And so they drank, they ate, and they were merry. There was more to life then some silly tournament, and as long as they stuck together everything would be okay.

Or would it?

From the Evil Layer (aka the former home of the Winnipeg Jets) the tournament director and the Depressatron 3000 watched the team in their crystal ball. "THIS WILL NOT DO!!! ROY CANNOT BE HAPPPPPPPPPPYYYYYYYY!" and so began their new plan. Coach received an official tournament TXT MSG :

!!!!!games maybe not cancelled. maybe!!!!!!

This plan worked better then their best nightmare. Rather then partying robustly, as had been the plan, a group of young foolish royboys returned to the hotel after dinner. The tragedes, it seemed, would never end.

Not everyone was fooled though, Satan had not accounted for two things. Those two things were: D**** C. AND J****** B.

{Stay tuned for part 2, up soon}