2006 Idle Time Winter Games at Natomas – December 9, 2006

Volleyball

Gold Medal: Pocket Protectors — Brian and Jill Pellerin, Amanda Plasencia, Kevin Hayes

Silver Medal: Team Sweden — Mike and Matt Di Gino, Rex Flores, Will Howell

Bronze Medal: Team Sexy Back — Ian Powell, Donald Hanson, Will Updegraff, Tim Sheel, Stu Potts

Team Bandito showed up to play, but may have suffered from the five-man rotation initiated by Russell One-Under’s whiny insistence that he’s “taking his backpack and going home.  With all your stuff.”
Team Sexy Back (Donald: “Black Hole Society!  Waaah!  We’re Black Holes!  We’re Black!”  You wish Donald.)  also came ready to compete, equipped with a secret weapon — Diet Soda + Eggs = New-and-Improved Ian.  The Hoodies came back with a vengeance to upset the Banditos in the Bronze Medal game (with Tim Hanks again on the sidelines) but the real surprise was the hustle and flow of the Pocket Protectors.
Amanda, Jill, Brian, and Kevin (although you’d never know by looking at his immaculately-clean sweater vest) all took turns eating grass and saving balls en route to a Gold Medal victory over Sweden.  Yay Pocket!

Wiffle Ball

Gold Medal: Team Sweden

Silver Medal: The Banditos — Serge Soria, Nate Cramton, Tim Hanks, Jeremy Nguyen, (Russell ?)

Bronze Medal: Pocket Protectors

The wettest part of the day forced our four-inning format to two-inning battles in the mud.  Defense proved the difference as Team Sweden posted scoreless second innings against both Pocket in the prelims and the Banditos in the Gold Medal games to earn first place.
Donald got lost on an In-and-Out run (easy to find in the middle of the night, on foot, out of your mind; hard to spot in the car in broad daylight), but eventual Big Phun Award winner Matt Isenhower filled in for Team Sexy Back, allowing Pocket to earn their Bronze by destroying them on the diamond, rather than just accepting the forfeit.  Yay Pocket!

Disc Golf

Gold Medal: The Banditos

Silver Medal: Team Sweden

Bronze Medal: Pocket Protectors

The Banditos absolutely demolished the competition in their signature event.  In fact, every member of Team Bandito took first place in their respective round and four of the five best scores were tossed out by the orange-clad conquistadors.
Only one player lost a disc over a fence (a spectacular roof knock courtesy of Diet Soda Powell) and Serge finally beat Matt in head-to-head play.  Natomas is built for the tomahawk.
Plus, Jill had a great time frolfing in the rain and the Protectors, despite being composed entirely of disc golf virgins, took a respective third.  Yay Pocket!

Catch the Greasy Dog
Gold Medal: Rex Flores (Team Sweden)
Silver Medal: Kevin Hayes (Pocket Protectors)
Bronze Medal: Jeremy Nguyen (The Banditos)
Rex won the event he made up, as four rumbling bumbling frenzied fools did their best at scaring the crap out of poor Elvis for twelve minutes.  Nelson admitted that next time (next time! Nelson used the words next time!) competitors should pursue Elvis one at a time, racing the clock.
The first round was one of the most entertaining moments all afternoon, and Jeremy’s oufit alone ended up securing him a bronze medal despite never actually catching el perro.

Overall Standings
1.  Team Sweden – 11 points
2.  Pocket Protectors – 7 points
3.  The Banditos – 6 points
4.  Team Sexy Back – 1 point (and Slinkys)

Other Assorted Medals:
Spirit Award: Shelley Salas — Thank you Shelley for enduring the elements and taking such great care with the scoring, photographs, and general morale-boosting.
Hustle Award: Sherice Wu — Thank you Sherice for giving up a day of fun in the rain to work on your design finals and driving all the way out to Roseville to pick up the delectable Harvest Hefeweizen.
Big Phun Award (presented by Big Phun himself, Nelson Wong): Matt Isenhower — Thank you Matt for complaining, smoking your grody Swishers, pitching in, helping out, and bowing out so gracefully from your Beer Shuffle session.  You’re the phunnest.
Coolest Dog Award: Elvis, the Dog — You can never truly be caught Elvis, greasy or otherwise.  Sorry for stressing you out, man.  Next bacon treat is on us.
Beer Shuffle Honors: Serge “Captain America is a fascist” Soria and Tim Hanks.  You guys earn all kinds of alcohol-associated endurance awards for that triumph.  I’ll bet you guys would be really good at the shufflebeer game Nate kept talking about too.  Maybe next time.
Who’s the Shit? Award: Jill Pellerin — As if there was any doubt… Just ask her.

Thanks to everyone for humoring Rex and myself with a round of Marvel Scene-It.  Special thanks to Nate and Jeremy for bringing the evening’s real entertainment.