now I'm a real soccer player

BAM!

I got a red card last night during our 5-2 loss last night at indoor soccer. In a highly uncharacteristic display, I chased down this little bastard and boarded the shit out of him, right after he sent me ass over elbow at mid-field.

The guy was playing cheap, flopping all the time and drawing fouls on us which is ridiculous because we're in the super-amateur skill class. Obviously some kind of ringer. He also incessantly called for the ball and would throw his hands up in confusion if his teammates didn't respond. And dude picked on the weaker members of our team. So right at the end (after Ryan drew a yellow card for tackling the shit out of him) he challenged me and sent me to the turf. I got up, watched him and Ryan run afer the ball, and basically just charged at him. Two seconds earlier and the ball would have been at his feet and I possibly could have avoided the foul, but who cares. It was kind of worth it. At first I felt terrible, and was embarrassed. But after awhile I felt like, oh well, shit happens. Even his own team seemed kind of annoyed at him. I told English Dave that I felt bad about it and he told me not to and almost seemed proud. He said the ref was just waiting for this kind of scenario with this guy to happen, that everyone on the field knew I was going to rush him, and that I am lucky that I didn't know how to tackle properly or else there could have been an injury.

Moral of the story is don't fuck with me playing soccer apparently. I avoided the two-game suspension and fine because the ref and our team have a little rapport, and he either was feeling forgiving or -as I'd like to believe- he wanted to see that fucker go down.