Monday, November 28, 2016

Expecting the unexpected


Last weekend, I played in a tournament in Silver Lake, WI with surprising results. My first round was rated over 2 shots better than any tournament round I ever played and even though I tired at the end of the second round and lost a title playoff on the third hole due to a 100ft shot that my opponent made, it marked the first time in 15 tournaments over a span of three years that I finished in the top half of a division in an open event. (As opposed to an event only available to members of a club) When I started to play in the 50+ division, this type of performance and result was what I was planning to see but my play over the last 3 years made this scenario become unlikely.

Now that the sting of the loss is fading, I can focus on the good and try to figure out how it happened and more importantly how to repeat similar results in the future.

Being the 4th Saturday in November, it was barely above freezing and most of the trees had no leaves. The temps did not bother me as I wore a sweater and winter hat at the start then a regular hat and long sleeve shirt the rest of the round as I got warm. My weight might have kept me from needing to wear as much as others proving me less discomfort in throwing a disc and no doubt the lack of leaves on trees made the tighter shots appear far more open.

It is possible that working out has given me more distance which showed on a couple of shots where I could go all out and a lighter and stronger version of me would probably fatigue less during an event in 2017. It is possible that me practicing to stay loose between rounds was a factor to why I tired at the end.

The course has to be a factor since the only other time I played it in July at a club event, I had my previous highest rated round. More than half the tees are elevated which definitely helps since I have a low flight. Though the course has duel locations for baskets, the distances of the holes to each basket fit my game as most of them are either within my reach on the first shot or too long or difficult for most other players to reach. The highest rated player in my division last Saturday which would normally be 5 shots per round better than me also played in the club event last July and only finished one shot better than me so having this result twice means the course suits my game.

A large factor has to be the player. Only one putt less than 20 feet was missed in the 38 holes I finished though 4 of them did hit the top of the front of the bucket but still went in. Since early October, a whole lot of disc golf was played even with a sore elbow/arm and Saturday’s result showed that.

Learning how to use midrange discs per the advice of a pro who ran the Memorial Day weekend event I worked has helped along with adding a couple of them to my bag. My failed attempt to get my first ace has also helped my overall game as I use midrange discs on 6 of the 9 holes at Horizon Park. There were multiple shots where I threw a midrange full shot close when before that it would have required a less than full shot with a driver.
Thinking about it, the most important factor might be the attitude of the player towards the game. Within the past 2 months, disc golf became the primary focus and not secondary as far as time and energy and the results show it. I believe that I had spent time and money sitting in a theatre in Aurora in late October and in a hotel in November in Lombard what happened that day would have been less positive. For similar results to continue in 2017, that has to remain.

A few hours after posting, I remembered something from 1995 and 2001:

Next year is NOT guaranteed!

There will be a 2017 but there is no way I can be 100% sure that an obese level 2, 51 year old man who has had multiple surgeries on his knees and who takes medicine originally designed for chemotherapy for life and pain killers to play will be able to drive his old, beat up car to events next April and be able to play at or even near the level shown.

During workouts, the sting of the event shows and it is important to use it to build my body and not to damage it.

Sunday, November 27, 2016

Season recap

Though my arm started having issues in October, I was still able to play through the end of November. Here is the results:

Club level rounds played: 5
Club level CTP won: 2
League level rounds played: 2
Shots below worst ever rated round in a league: 3
Tournaments played: 7
Advanced division: 1
Novice division: 1
Advanced grandmaster division (50+): 5
Shots in one round that was better than best ever rated round: 3
Shots in one event that was better than best ever rated event: 6
Player pack earnings: $45
Tournament winnings: $3
Times a practice shot at a CTP hole would have won: 3
New courses played: 9
Total holes with a birdie which I did not have one before: 50
Total with left handed drive: 4
Total par 4 holes with birdie: 1

Chips made: 1

Chips seen to win playoff against me: 1
Number of discs purchased: 0
Number of discs given as thanks for working an event: 1

Number of discs as part of player's pack: 2
Number of discs from used bag given as thanks for helping person move: 12
Number of those discs I traded for two I would use: 2

Number of discs added to my bag: 5
Number of discs lost: 0

Number of discs removed from bag: 2
Number of aces I saw live after never seeing any before: 4
Number of times I hit the basket on a first shot: 6
Different discs used on those shots: 4
Number of aces: 0

Tuesday, November 15, 2016

Modifying the College

With the mostly unexpected result of Donald Trump winning the 2016 presidential election, (I am still in disbelief writing those words) the way the US determines the president is under scrutiny since assigning electors from each state in most cases under a winner take all basis allowed Trump to defeat Clinton even though he has fewer total votes in spite of what a couple of conservative outlets are claiming. Trump decided to focus his campaign on the states that were close avoiding those with large Democratic populations.

The most obvious solution would be a popular vote. However, that could create chaos in a close election of over 120 million votes which could require that massive a recount. No doubt that is one of the reasons the US is reluctant to go to that method using one that is quicker to determine the winner even if one electoral vote from Alaska for Trump represents 43,000 votes for him and one from Illinois for Clinton represents 144,000 who voted for her.

Since electors from each state are determined by the breakdown of the 535 in Congress plus 3 for DC, I thought why not do what Maine and Nebraska do and split 435 of the votes by congressional district and the other 100 at 2 per state?

I thought of another alternative. I went by the Wikipedia state by state result of the election and multiplied the percentage of voted of those who did not have the most votes in the state by the total electoral votes in the state, rounded that down, then assigned the rest of the votes to those who won the state.

Since Clinton had 34.55% in Alabama which has 9 ev, she would get 3 and Trump 6.

Since Trump had 32.8% in California which has 55 ev, he would get 18.
Since Johnson had 3.24% in California, he would get 1.
Clinton would get the other 36.

Using that way the results would be:

McMullin: 1 (Utah)
Johnson: 2 (CA and TX)
Clinton: 266
Trump: 269

It would go to the house or be decided by third party electors. *sigh*

Saturday, November 12, 2016

Pandemic Legacy 12

After we recovered from the shock of hearing that Quarantine Expert Klinger worked with El Guapo, we had to find patient zero in Mexico City as he would be the final piece to getting a vaccine.

To make things easier, Operations Expert Rizzo was assigned to establish a military base there after setting up a road block out of Miami preventing faded people from infecting the rest of North America. We also had a scary moment in Chicago as the Scientist and Researcher were in New York City while the base was being set up. Fortunately, Chicago was quarantined before it spread.

While spending our efforts in the search, there were outbreaks elsewhere. Eventually the team were able to control the damage, cure the new strains, and by replacing the Researcher with Medic Hunnicutt, treat those who were still ill. However, San Francisco had an outbreak and for the first time in almost a half a year, the faded figures spread to more cities infecting Tokyo and Manila.

The world was near panic due to outbreaks as we destroyed the San Francisco and Bogota military bases and after getting more info the Medic was just about to find patient zero when the scientist decided to treat those in Seoul first which prevented the outbreak which would have ended things at that time.

We did add more vaccine treatment equipment after.

Monday, November 7, 2016

Least of evils.

I HATE that phrase when applying to voting almost as much as third party votes don't count.

Tomorrow, I will head to the polling place and I am obliged to use that idea when I grab the marker. I am not a fan of HRC. I don't trust her, I am opposed to those whose votes were the margin of victory over Bernie Sanders in the primary in which I don't trust how it went, and I believe that some of what many have said about her is true.

I know there are more than two running and like every election I have voted (since 1984) I want to vote for one of them. I then examined what the others have to offer but found them having extreme views of the two main parties and not worth my vote.

But what about the white GOP man? In the 20th century, I would have easily voted for him over a woman no matter what but this is 2016. I wanted Trump to give me a reason to vote for him. He not only didn't but make me realize I have no choice but HRC.

The GOP has this century turned toward the religious angle for support. By doing that, they have turned me away. I am even forced to vote for the lesser candidate for Senate since her party needs to have a majority if for nothing else but to fill a vacancy in the SCOTUS that the current majority GOP refuses to acknowledge and to also keep dated ideals that were created centuries ago from influencing law.

Friday, November 4, 2016

Pandemic Legacy part 11


September was a difficult month for us at UnIT. We were again on top of our game so the idea of locating a rogue soldier in Bogota or San Francisco did not seem difficult since we found the virologist and immunologist without issue and were 1/3 the way of developing a vaccine for the faded people issue in Africa and 2/3 of the Americas. We replaced our researcher with our operations expert since this was a military issue and with the Cairo base established, we now had a fully functional base in all parts of the world.

We got info on the solider but not enough to find him. However, that search meant the rest of the world was neglected and by the time we were able to focus on that, it was too late. Our quarantine expert requested for a paramilitary escort for future operations and was approved.

Later in the month, we got good intel and with new government aid the quarantine expert almost located the soldier before leaving. Shortly after, our medic, who due to being a veteran was added to the team for the operations expert, found the soldier who had some unexpected information.

We knew that El Guapo developed the disease in Mexico City but we had no idea members of UNIT were involved as well. It turned out there is a group called Zodiac which El Guapo is a member along with our quarantine expert who disappeared once he realized who we found. We also realized that the full military operation which we initially opposed then assisted to create needs to be shut down by destroying the permanent UNIT bases we created.

We got a report a day later that a Miss Noble found in her garbage the ID badge of our quarantine expert and was actually travelling around Europe gathering information about the anti vax issue and treating the ill. Since we were dealing with the Martian water issue in the Far East as well the fall of Sydney and Khartorum in spite of getting government quarantine assistance, we did not have resources to go after Miss Noble until everything in North and South America tipped causing the world to go to shut down mode again.

Since we did eradicate this strain of the Silurian illness, we developed a faster method to cure it and we also requested and received C4 as well as riot gear to handle military bases and faded cities. We were told that with the new development, we will get more aid.