Post Number 101

Cross out Dalmatians and add Blog. No wait, leave Dalmatians, that's one of my favorite movies!

You lucky dog, you. You're reading my 101st blog post! If you've read all 101, you're either a)obsessed with me or b)my mother or c) just bored and have nothing better to do, but I thank you anyway! And hope that I can give you lots to laugh and shake your head at for many more blog posts to come!

What else to talk about than my crazy work-filled/marathon training/mishap life?!? 

First- This last weekend UAlbany IM's put on a Flag Football Officials' Clinic and Tournament for NIRSA. And yours truly was the Tournament Host/Director/NOT AT ALL QUALIFIED BUT SURE I GOT THIS THING person in charge.

Internally screaming Noooo for the love of God nooooo!

Let's take a stroll down memory lane shall we? Yes, let's. 

-Less than 3 years ago I went to my first NIRSA Flag Football Tournament at Notre Dame in the Fall of 2013. And I was astounding by the intensity, the level of knowledge the other clinicians had and I was frigid. Like frozen to the bone the entire time. I wrote about it in my blog and talked about how amazed I was and that I definitely felt like a baby dolphin in a sea of sharks. One of these is not like the others...and she's way out of her league, that's me!

Just add about 3 inches of snow, wind at 30 mph and picture me shivering to death trying to keep score and that was what Notre Dame looked like.

Now, fast forward to September 30th, 2016. And there I was setting up fields and hotels, and working out every last detail that we had already scoured over for the past 9 months preparing for this endeavor. 

We had 5 teams (barely, thanks to Boston for bringing some kiddos to combine with my kiddos to make a semi-legit team) 30 officials, 12 clinicians (a few of whom that LITERALLY wrote the flag football rule book. Not joking or exaggerating in the slightest either-cross my heart) 6 student staff members at any given time, not enough pizza (apparently when feeding 50 officials it's actually like feeding 75) a social that I'm fairly certain the wait staff have black listed us from returning (no one got too rowdy but we definitely saw some regular patrons walk in and then walk right back out), a bit of a hotel debacle as the poor college kid got SUPER frustrated with my room list and said "whoever made this reservation is a FREAKING GENIUS" and then I walked up and said, Hello, I'm Marissa and I'm your freaking genius. That shut him up. We also had one Field hockey Ref that got upset that our whistles for the tournament would interrupt the UAlbany Field Hockey game vs. Maine and made us move fields (still bitter. Very bitter. Not going to lie, I'll stay bitter probably forever, no offense Maine Field Hockey but I won't ever like you) AND we somehow managed to pull it off.

Freaking Field Hockey...Who actually plays this sport anyway??

All of the games were played. No one forfeited. All of the officials got to watch and learn and take back some solid knowledge and experiences that they can take back to their prospective campuses. We had a New York team win and move on to a Regional Tournament (like the one I went to at Notre Dame. See the theme here? We do lots of tournaments in rec sports) and I spent roughly 40 hours working this weekend (I got about 4 hours of sleep each night).

Marissa, MBA, Recreation Professional, AND Successful Tournament Host. Yes, I'll be adding that to my email signature. I don't care if I look braggadocious, I am freaking proud of myself and my team for doing what we did. 

My GA and the Supervisors worked their tales off. Did I mention that we had 5 other club soccer teams on campus for a round robin of games? Yeah. And that we still had IM Slow Pitch Softball to play? Yep. Count that too. I have a staff of 9 and needed 12...every single one of them did at least one shift. Many did much more. They put in major work and I'm getting them all donuts for tomorrow's morning supervisor meeting.

Even though I can't hide my emotions and everyone could tell my anxiety and stress levels were through the roof, I had a great time. I love it. I laughed with some other rec professionals that were there at Notre Dame 3 years ago when I was just getting started. I met others and was able to expand my network but also my friend list (more important, obvi). And I think everyone was impressed with our little program that we have at UAlbany. We do with what we have the best that we can. If that means using racquetball courts as a conference room, then so be it. If that means we have 3 undergrads, 1 GA and 1 clueless professional (me) lining fields hours before the first game would start because we had to wait for grounds keeping to finish mowing the grass then you can bet on us being out there, liners and fresh paint ready to go. (Those lines were actually kinda awful and not straight but who brings a protractor to work everyday...) 

Braggadocious is actually a real word. True story.

And I was once again, amazed by how great my staff did. They are a good bunch, and they work very hard. And I was complimented by others on how great they were. This isn't the first time it happened but I am that mother hen that is just beaming with pride over her little chicks. They're all growing up so fast! 12 months ago they were all little babies who had big, wide eyes and now they basically run the program without me (basically. If my boss reads this, I don't want to lose my job).

They have come a long way. And I'm excited for their future. If I can help them become contributing adults to society through IM Sports, then it was a good day in my book. Not all of them will go down the Rec Sports path, but I can only try and prepare them to adapt to whatever life throws them. Whether it's having to move fields at the last minute, or working on a budget proposal at a finance company, I hope they lean on what they learned under my direction. 

Even a few of them call me "Mom" and I fuss but secretly I like that they see me as someone they can not only joke with but always be there for them too.

So to those that are reading this and took part in the tournament and clinic (and my mother for listening to me vent about it for months prior, during and after) a huge round of applause and A Big Thank You All too! I brag that it was all me, but we all know that without the contributions from people like you, it wouldn't have been 1/2 the experience that it was. I'm humbled that you all would come out to little UAlbany and do what we do best - talk sports. 

I was going to talk about my marathon training and how I'm too competitive to actually be a runner because I HATE getting passed by other people on the trail... But I'm going to save it for later because it's almost my bed time and this girl is still trying to catch up on sleep. 

To be continued!