We are the champions, my friend...
This morning our soccer team went the distance and beat a pretty decent team (again), but this time for the championship. They scored first; I don't even remember how they scored. We went in at the half down 1-0. Of course, I didn't start because I really had to pee -- immediately before the start of the game. So I went on in left midfield, a little out of position, but midfield's good (especially since last week I played sweeper all game; loved it, had a great game, but midfield's more natural). What is it about our team that says, "Jam the ball up the right side" even when our weakest players are all on the right side? Our top scorer was playing left forward. I was probably our strongest midfielder, and I was on the left. But the keeper's distribution was all right sided!

OK, after half, I came in at center midfield. That worked well. I was able to get into the flow of the game. We equalized on a pretty decent shot, then were awarded a penalty for a handball in the box. That call was a bit dicey -- sure, he handled, sure, but not flagrantly, not a bad hand ball at all. So anyway, Jamie slotted that one home (a decent keeper would have guessed correctly and could have easily stopped that ball). So we took a 2-1 lead. They threw everything they had at us; we took our time on all restarts (let them run after their errant shots). We got a corner kick and I walked out to take it (more to milk a little more clock, but also because Gus is notoriously poor at corner kicks!).

It felt... surreal. I knew that we were going to score. I looked up, and there seemed to be tons of room in the 18. Gus was calling for the ball, completely unmarked (but with a poor angle). I stepped up, put a high ball just inside the spot, watched someone attack it, head it home... an OWN GOAL. I don't know what happened. It's not like he's a bad player. He was just attacking the ball, running to defend an open player in front of the net. Anyway, that was the final margin. 3-1. And we took home the t-shirts.

The end.