Intramurals Observed.

"That is bull****!" You are a 50 something year old father and your 20 something year old son just said that in an INTRAMURAL flag-football game. Not to mention you literally traveled hundreds of miles to be there from the great (?) state of Georgia. How do you feel? Perhaps slightly disappointed that your son would completely lose his temper over a game that literally means nothing? Yeah, me too. And you'd think that this Georgian father would think something similar. The following words protruded from that Georgia mouth: "Ref, you suck." Welcome to the wonderful (?) world of Intramural sports on the Lord's campus.

It reminds me of when I was kid, we had this game called "Fill Or Bust." Every time it came to be my turn, I flipped the card with the green-eyed ambition of a 10 year old before his weekly Saturday morning Pokemon installment. Occasionally however, my turn would be skipped. And I would lose it. For some strange reason, I would have a miniature brain aneurysm and freak out like a Pacific Rim kaiju on an unsuspecting Asian community. Only not as loud, and my freakout would probably have made a better movie. Anyways, I had an out of body experience as I observed this particular incident first-hand. It was the worst side of my 9 year old self, in a grown man. With another even more grown up man encouraging it.

Intramural sports is a tricky physiological experiment. Considering BYU is basically Mormon breeding grounds, pride plays a fairly huge role. Like with gorillas. Or ducks. Thanks, Dani. Apparently ducks do that. But anyways, Intramural sports is the sweaty hot-bed of these breeding grounds. Men beat their chests as they go to great extremes to impress their potential mates anxiously sitting on their blankets. Don't get me wrong, we all want to impress our girls, and stretch our legs a little bit. However, here's a few things to consider when participating in intramural sports.

1) The measure of a man is not proven in an intramural game. I too have felt the sting of my opponent beating his chest a little harder than I beat mine. Then something dawns on me: it don't mattah. It really don't. Plus, I get to go home with Dani. Find your personal Dani, that's what really counts.

2) Believe it or not, you probably won't convince a girl that you're worth pursuing on the intramural field. At least not the kind of girl you really want to be with. I asked Dani to sum up her experience on the intramural sidelines, she basically said, "...so many sweaty butts." Yep, there you have it. She didn't glorify some diving touch down, she was just grossed out by the amount of sweat on those butts. So ask yourself, is there anything of worth behind that sweaty butt of yours? Yeah, I know what I said. Well if there is, that's what really counts, and a good girl will see that.

3) Never, ever bring a video camera to your game. The year was 2009. I was yet again suckered into thinking flag-football was fun. Which actually happens sort of often. Sorry, flag-football is sort of fun. So this guy was basically forcing his doting wife to balance a newly born baby along with capturing all of his intramural sport moments of glory on film. And he also got sort of mad when his wife seemed a little more focused on the baby. This actually happened.

Okay, so there will be more words of advice to come in the future. You see, the world of intramural sports would take a book to properly breakdown. So I hope you enjoy these random installments as they come. So be the guy who makes intramural sports wonderful, which they can be. Be the guy that reminds everyone it's all about having fun and getting a little exercise. So uh, basically, stay gold.