The 2010 YNN Fightin' Niners

On Monday August 30, 2010, the YNN Fightin’ Niners will participate in something the team hasn’t seen in years… a playoff game.

We’re all excited to compete with the best (for hopefully the next couple weeks) but we can’t forget the journey we took this summer to get to where we are today.

The season has practically flown by, well unless you’re Maureen who’s caught almost every game, at least half of them in the 85+ degree heat.

While our team is full of different types of personalities and talent, we have found a way to work together, perform, and finish with an 11-5 record. (Not bad for a team that only won a few games last year)

To explain our team, I guess it’s best to start at the top (of the batting order.)

Kippins was a core player. With speed that would even make Ricky Henderson tip his hat, Skipp could tap the ball and be on third before the opposing team even touches the ball.

However  there are times where he only gets to first. That’s where Skipps second half comes in. The Contact Extraordinar… Sarah! With just the tap of the bat, she’s successfully moved over Kippens at most a dozen times, helping us score on multiple occasions.

Some of our big hitters consist of Matt our short stop and photographer. Our center fielder and shortstop Tim. Our fearless leader, outfielder, fohawk wearing coach Carl. Of course yours truly batting a cool .680 with 5 home runs (yes I love stats and yes I’m a dork for keeping them.)

We can’t forget the other players of the team that made this season possible, basically because we’d have to forfeit without them. The lady niners include Ellie , our second baseman. Maureen our trooper behind the plate. Amy who pitches, plays infield, and hits like Dotty Henson! (she also brings her fiancé Ryan to hit sometimes. HAHA) Ashley was only able to show up a few times but basically was our short stop with a sweet swing. I can’t forget one of our power house batters that I couldn’t add to our big hitters simply because she’s like the Barry Bonds of softball, Laura who hits it over everyone’s heads simply because they always move in when a girl is up to bat. Sucks for them, works for us!

I also can’t forget about our team parent, Molly, who was our number one supporter always seemed to have a snack for all of us. (Juice boxes, crackers, or freeze pops!)

We also have guest appearances from Liz, Lori, and Sam who have helped contribute to our non forfeited games. Whether it be a win or a loss, at least we get to play.

We also wouldn’t have much of a team with out the help of our other Niners.

There’s Collie, with his hidden speed. Sully who I should have labeled in our big hitters group (only if he played more games.) John who we lost for most of the season because of an injury. George who’s helped us in the outfield. Joe added his pitching, pull hitting, and occasional swearing. Nick was also able to show off his INCREDIBLE pitching skills. He was able to walk more batters in one inning than anyone else combined the whole year. He also almost hit a homerun… almost.

Oh and then there’s Ken. Our co-captain who hurt his poor wittle ankle. Just kidding. He’s also known for hitting my car. Bastard.

This year has definitely been a great time for all. We’ve laughed, cried, walked off, and drank free beer.

Even if our playoff run is short lived, we still have the fall to keep the fun going.

But most importantly, the greatest thing to come from this year is obviously the FREE HATS!!!

30 Days of Fail

For the past 4 months I have been on an exercise hiatus. While I’ve played about 15 softball games and spent about 40 dollars for a gym membership that might as well be used as toilet paper, I’ve practically been immobile. I think however that I’ve finally hit a point where I’m sick of doing nothing. I belong to a gym, live next to a park, and have 10+ pairs of shorts that lack sweat. So I’ve decided to create my own workout for the next 30 days. Why 30 days? I’ll tell you why, hence the blog. 30 days from August 16th is September 15th which happens to be my 24th birthday. There’s really no rhyme or reason, it just happens to be 30 days away and I don’t have much going on until then. (lucky me)

The next question I had for myself was what kind of work out do I attempt, nay, complete  during my 30 days. I’ve practically done every workout there is from all cardio to fast paced weight lifting, and there’s really only one thing I could try that I’ve never done before.

I came up with, the Until Fail Workout, or for title purposes during my duration, “30 Days of Fail.”

When I use to work out with my buddy Kevin back home in MA, we occasionally did weight lifting reps until fail, which for all you non-gym goers, is lifting weight until you absolutely, positively, crying for your momma can’t do it anymore. Kevin unlike myself could rep a lot more than me, so this is where he got his kicks, punches, and Mike Tyson Knockouts in. I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy it either, the results were worth it at the time. I lost weight quicker, and gained a lot of muscle.

Since going to the gym and lifting a bar bell over my head for 19 minutes until I failed wouldn’t really accomplish anything, I’ve decided to mix my once upon a time cardio workout with the until fail idea.

The idea would basically be to pick a form of cardio, whether it be walking, running, jogging, biking, stair-ing, or elliptically until I either drop or puke. Hell, maybe even both. Most likely both.

I still belong to the gym so everything will be accessible to me with no excuses. I will document every day for viewing pleasure. If anything it will help continue my on going articles without any down time and entertain any readers I still have. Also I plan to update constantly on my twitter account, so if you're really feeling up to it, you can follow me as destroy my body. http://twitter.com/PaulMSnyder

During my routine, I welcome insight, opinions, and of course the ever popular favorite… criticism.

So tomorrow (or today if you’re reading this on the 16th) I will leave work, grab my shorts, and head out the door for a run or jog, and hopefully by the end, a crawl.

If I’ve done this correctly you should be able to hear me by the end of the day. I’ll be the only guy in the Capital Region crying on my side, screaming for my momma.

Wish me, and over weight body, luck.

Stay tuned… Day 1 is coming up next.

M-I-C, K-E-Y, M-O-U-GOTTA BE KIDDING ME

For this particular blog I am going to attempt to do some that’s been quite difficult for me to in most of my posts. I am going to try and tell this story with using the phrase, “That’s what she said.” While it is one of my all time favorite phrases (I loathe Steve Carell for this), I’ve found myself saying it and typing it too often. So without another 17 seconds of wasting your time… here we go!

The other day I was woken up by girlfriend who seemed to be having a slight panic attack. After asking her what was wrong she told me I had to get up… (resisting, resisting). Well obviously! You don’t wake someone up to tell them to go back to bed. That’s like firing someone so they’ll work.

Anyway, I asked her what was wrong and she told me there was a mouse in our bathroom. My first thought was “Why?” My first thought should have been “How?” but we’re talking about the kid who called his dad before the fire department when his car caught on fire during his senior year of high school. (Fun fact for you)

So I got up and walked to the bathroom. With my girlfriend behind me I walked up to the door and slowly started to peak my head into the bathroom, and… I didn’t see anything.

I opened the door quickly, ran in, and slammed the door behind me. I searched my bathroom all over the place (all 5 square feet of it) and finally found a small, tiny, computer mouse sized mouse curled up in the corner, shaking like Muhammad Ali.

Well I figured, since I have a landlord, that I might as well call him to figure out what he was going to do. The conversation went something like this:

Me: Hi. I have a bit of a predicament.

Landlord: What can I do for you?

Me: My girlfriend discovered a mouse in our bathroom. I would like to know how you’re going to handle it.

Landlord: (girlish shrill) Oh My Gawd! Are you serious? I don’t know. I’m afraid of mice. See what you can 
do about it.

Me: Are You Effin’ Kidding Me!?

Needless to say I decided to take measures into my own hands… well actually, measures into my own cooking pots and pans. I grabbed the biggest pot I could find and jumped back into the bathroom.

It was like trying to wrangle up a pig. The mouse wouldn’t cooperate and all of a sudden I felt like Nathan Lane. (From Mouse Hunt, not The Producers)

After about 20 minutes of exercise in my bathroom (hold it together Paul... not this time) I finally caught him with my toilet cleaner. Yes you heard me right, my toilet cleaner. (See picture)

Well actually, it was the holder for the toilet brush. Who knew the bottom of it was hollow? Not this kid!

So I slip a magazine under the holder and asked my girlfriend to open the doors for me. So she Usain Bolted out both doors while I made myself outside. I put the container on the ground expecting the mouse to run off. 

Instead it insisted on hanging around. We’ll I had to get to work in 4 hours and I was in no mood to just “chill.” So I kicked the damn thing and the mouse shot out like Augustus Gloop.

I walked back inside, washed my rodent infested hands, contemplated throwing out the pots and pans, decided to throw out the toilet holder, made fun of my girlfriend for standing on a chair, and went back to sleep.

To all of you that may run into the same situation, save yourself some time and simply ask your landlord when applying for an apartment whether or not he likes peanuts and never forgets.

Because chances are, if he does, then he probably shares other characteristics of Elephants as well which could leave you playing Mouse Trap.

Remember that game?? No one knew how to play it but we all knew how to set it up. Best 10 seconds ever. That's what she said... DAMMIT!!