I'm A Man Who Discovered The Wheel And Built The Eiffel Tower Out Of Metal And Brawn. That's What Kind Of Man I Am.

You're damn straight about that!

This last weekend was the 33rd annual CanAm Rugby Tournament, right here at home (er, Saranac lake - close enough). Which mostly just means that I got the hell beaten out of me more than at any other point this season. I have:

• A sore neck
• A sun burn
• No feeling in the last two fingers of my right hand
• More bruises than I can count

It's much deeper in color (and I'm less hairy) in person.

That bruise is actually a result of our match a week ago against Rutland. Part of my knee swelled up just after the match, went away by the following morning, then the bruise started to appear. Doesn't hurt, much. Here's us vs. Rutland:

The gentleman seen reffing in that picture is Terry, one of our player/coaches/old boys. He called a great, flowing game. Hands in the ruck? Offside? No problem. As long as both teams were bending the rules equally, play was allowed to continue.

Here's some shots from CanAm:

I'm second one in the line out, tape around my ears. At this point, I had two good lifters, so when I jumped, I soared. And I was safe. Earlier in the game, the guy that was my second lifter EFF'ING DROPPED ME. Six feet in the air, make the catch, then flat on my back. I threw a punch at the dumb-ass as I was getting up.

This is from the Plattsburgh paper - the guys in green are the second team we played. The black guy was about 6'4", 270. I only had to hit him once (he was a freaking center - which means not only was he big, but he had wheels), and I managed to knock him out of bounds so he couldn't score a second try. Okay, I did have some help with that...

The boy got to play some touch rugby...I should have some more (and hopefully better) pictures of this tomorrow.

Finally, apparently my dad got the head from my brother's latest deer back from the taxidermist. Take a look at my parents living room.

I think they should put up some knotty pine trim and furniture, get a couple of throne like chairs and some beer steins, and make it look like an authentic Bavarian hunting lodge. They'd have to move the treadmill, too.

I'll be back tomorrow with some more pictures, and some more inane chatter.

And then something went terribly awry...