ReinoutJansen

So, I've been less then active on DA, and with my painting the last couple of months. This afternoon I got together with several of my buddies though and I'm very motivated to pick it up again.

On my way back home a plan occured to keep me motivated while painting. As a fan of most Space Marine Chapters/Legions, and with a stack of unpainted Marines I've set the task for myself to paint at least one Marine every week, with every week dedicated to another legion. I've just started by painting a Tactical Marine in the colours of the (pre-heresy) Emperor's Children.

I plan to switch between Loyalist and Traitor, next week being Imperial Fists and the week after Iron Warriors. Besides that I'm not going to set any regulations as to type of unit, rank, etc.

I hope to get the first pictures uploaded tomorrow and I hope that you'll guys will stick with me to help me keep improving!

I don't believe I ever wrote 2 journals so quick after each other.  And again it is about football.

Today I was at the "Nijmegen Pirates family-day". It was a lot of fun starting with a mix-flag-football tournament. We played flag-football with family members and friends. After that we had a delicious BBQ and the awards for MVP, rookie of the year etc. were handed out.

Then came the moment when our current head coach Martin Doomen held his farewell speech, he will be leaving us after two years in which we reached the play-offs and the finals for the first time.

He spoke a lot about his time with the Pirates of course and how he saw us grow, how we should continue growing and if we do that we'll make it to the first division in a couple of years. There was one thing he said that made me think about 'why' I play football at all.

I love the contact, the sheer brutality of man-to-man combat, the tactics and as I did enjoy being around my team-mates they were 'just' team-mates. As our coach started to talk about, no matter how cheesy it may sound, the fact that we're a family I discovered that the main reason for me to play football, even after all the hard times, the injured team-mates, I kept playing football because we're a brotherhood. Not only on the field.

When I was talking to one of the senior players he told me that when he had been playing for only half a year he had been about to be mugged when two fellow Pirates just happened to pass by. They came to his aid and they chased the bastards away.

Then I realized that when I'm with my team-mates I feel safe. Even though we're about to play the most violent team-sport in the world. We're all going to take it on together. We protect each others backs, we can speak our mind against each other. If we win or if we lose, we sweat, we bleed and we cry together.

Today was a great day. I realized why I play football again.

We live well, we fight hard. Nijmegen Pirates.


PS: I'm sorry if this doesn't make any sense, it was a long day and I might have had a couple of drinks (which is rare for me).

PPS: I believe this is the longest journal post I ever wrote xD

Well, I've been awfully inactive at DA the last couple of weeks. Luckily (for those of you who are interested) I'll be uploading pictures of my Space Hulk miniatures and a 'finished' version of my Blood Angel story pretty soon. I was able to buy Space Hulk in a shop which still had several in stock BTW.
Oh and today I reached the 5000 page views

Just finished packing up. I'll leave for Czech (is that how I spell it?.. In Dutch it is Tsjechië) this evening. I'll return in little over a week. For those of you who also have a holiday at the moment: Enjoy it For those who don't... Keep looking forward to it Well. Off I am.
And to quote a great (in-a-matter-of-speaking) man.

"Keep on trolling"

Today was the day of the Gladiators (my team) - Phantoms match. I woke up  8AM. At 9.30 I was at the Pirates building. I was shocked when I only say 2 others (who weren't going to play because they were too young), but they said the others were getting some spare equipment from the locker room. The others apparently meant two guys. We waited another half an hour. Another 2 guys showed up. That meant we had five guys. We left with the bus to the Falcons (we're a combined team). When we arrived there only eight guys joined us. In the Dutch competition you need 15 men to start a match. So the coaches gathered us. They told us the match would be played two hours later (at 2 PM instead of noon) and that it would be a practice match. We had forfeited the real game.
I'm a student with two weeks of very important tests coming up and it took me a while to convince my parents to let me go play the game while I should be studying. In the end me and another team-mate took the train back home while the rest of the team (including some players who were actually to young to play in our league) went to the match. I resented myself from the moment I left that bus. After that I spend most of the afternoon trying to study and wishing I was at the field. I just got a call from a team-mate.. We actually won the bloody practice-match. We lost our chance to get to the play-offs, and in a way I lost a great experience because we needed TWO more players.
Well I better go catch some sleep, to cool down a bit. Tomorrow are my Juristic finals. Next Monday I'll get another shot at playing football.
It should be the other way around but NEVER again shall schoolwork come between me and a football match.