Sterling Crimson

Me just before my 26th birthday! Squawk, I'm holding a macaw (I think?)

Kaspersky's expensive, but it does the job for me . Otherwise, Malwarebytes and Windows Defender are good

So I just played an intramural soccer game today. Actually, I played two. It's a tournament-esque type of event where our university divides up into teams to play soccer against each other. With this blog post, I'm going to give you guys an overview of what happened at both games and how they turned out. As of tonight, I've played 4 games with my teammates. Part 1: A Filler for a team in need of players So I came to the field where I was supposed to play at noon. My real game was at 1:00 pm but I noticed that one of the teams didn't have enough players. So their team hooked me up for a game, even if it meant little (they forfeited due to low numbers). Before the game started, I was talking with one of their team members, and as an ardent soccer follower, he remarked that I seemed the type to play central attacking midfielder. It's a position where I act as a striker, but also make good passes to my teammates when necessary to push the ball forward. It's the epitome of creativity! At this game, I was at my natural position: central attacking midfielder. I was to try making plays for the team while getting a chance to bag some goals of my own. Our side won 5-1. I helped out with the second goal by using my head at the midfield and pushing the ball forward for the striker to take hold. Throughout the game, I got a lot of ball touches. I managed to pass the ball around pretty well. Plus, I had a defender who blocked my volley that was destined for the net! It was such a wonderful cross! Then there was my header that I managed to hit because of another beautiful lob! Too bad the ball went just wide of the goal. Although I didn't score a goal, I felt really good about the assist and the chances I got; after all, it was the first time I ever attempted a header AND a volley in the same game! Part 2: The starter for our squad Now it's 1:00 pm, and I just finished playing the first game upon seeing my teammates arrive. I was hoping for a feast in front of the net. I warmed up with the first game and I wasn't even close to feeling tired! I wanted to win! I wanted to be involved in the right ways! For this game, I was once again playing Central Attacking Midfielder. But I don't think my teammates knew what that was, so I stuck with the label "midfielder". As you'll see, with this change of label... Things soon got depressing. Our opponents, who were down a girl and a guy, scored on us first because their two best players were dancing around our defenders with their feet. Now mind you, I stayed at the attacking half because I'm terrible at defense. After that, I wanted a goal. Badly. So when there was a goal kick, I immediately ran for the ball and controlled it. I passed it to my left seeing that our left winger was free. She ran up with the ball and crossed it to our striker who soon tied the game 1 all. This was where things went even worse. Our defenders simply couldn't handle our opponent's two talismans. They scored a goal to end the half and soon scored another to begin the second half from distance! It was raining too! But that's not the point. I didn't get any touches of the ball after that. I ran into open space but I just kept on getting frustrated at how NO ONE was giving me any passes! I don't want to hog the ball; I want to make the good passes to help our team move up! Our team was handed their first loss: 3-2. Yeah it could have been 3-1, but we got a penalty near the end of the game which was converted. My rant But I'm just confused. For much of the game, our team moved so far back that I ended up acting like a striker when I wanted to be an attacking midfielder. They're two different things! The worst part was that each time I called for the ball into open space, I either wasn't given the ball (80% of the time) or the ball was passed right into an opponent (20% of the time). I kept motioning the others to pass into space, but they didn't listen! At noon, I was playing with strangers and I played way better. It's been like this since the second game with my team! At our very first game in September, I got way more touches. I scored a goal AND assisted another one en route to a 3-0 win. I don't know what's happened since then, but in some ways, I feel like a ghost to my teammates. I want to contribute, but my teammates are stifling every chance at that! I'll make many more forward runs next week. I'll do everything I can to improve and get a play going. I feel much more fit now especially since I've played 2 games in succession today. But gosh, is it alright for me to tell them how I feel about all this? I want more touches and a chance to make some plays! At the same time, I don't want to sound arrogant (I know I sound pretty arrogant here, but it's all true! I don't want to hog the ball; I just want to make more passes to my teammates to create space for chances at goal!), but it's really hard not getting recognized by my teammates in team talks. I already said before that I want to play as an attacking midfielder, but they don't know what that is! I guess I'll have to try again sometime before our last game on Halloween... I just hope I get more chances to help out.

It was a very bittersweet moment seeing the CMCs finally get their cutie marks. They found their destiny in life quite sooner than I expected and they did in such a way that would reform Diamond Tiara. That being said, I felt that the things that happened with Diamond Tiara with her mother felt very rushed, but that's beside the point. I don't think CMC episodes will go completely dry. They could spend their time helping others find their cutie marks in life, or perhaps help the Mane 6 on their adventures. Perhaps there would be more things going on within the schoolhouse or beyond Equestria that require their help. Then there's the CMCs actually using their talents. Sweetie Belle could go on facing her fears (a nod to her first appearance) when it comes to singing, Applebloom could learn to work with construction, and Scootaloo could get involved with extreme sports or something. Just cause they received their cutie marks doesn't mean they can't develop it like the Mane 6 are doing continuously. If it were the case, then the Mane 6 might as well not have any more episodes either.

This was why I wanted to host an event like the World Cup on MLPF. Reading through all these quotes again has left me hoping that most of my Masters work will be done by the time I kickstart the qualifying phases of the 2017/2018 MLPF World Cup. Thanks @Stellafera for making the vid once again For those of you unaware of what I'm talking about, here's the thread for the inaugural edition. It's basically a huge voting tournament to determine who the forum's favourite pony is. And a chance to show which character you love the most healthily. https://mlpforums.com/topic/82112-go-to-post-2014-mlpf-world-cup-thread-for-final-results/ Also, the logo by @Zhooves