Marc @ TennisPulse

June Update

Marc Talcott — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 22:51:00 GMT

Its now late June, and I haven't gotten to work on the Coaching section, but I still plan to so keep checking back if you are a coach and want to get listed.

Wimbleton has just started so we've got a couple weeks of really good tennis coming up on Tennis Channel, thank goodness.

And me? Still hitting the court as much as I possibly can, which is 4-5 times a week for either practice or a match.

I don't have much to write about, and I'm seriously considering killing this blog and forums section of the site. No one uses the forums and my life is not very exciting to write about, but I do like having an easy spot to post updates.

Thanks for your support and I hope you all enjoy using http://www.TennisPulse.org.

-Marc

Finding a Tennis Coach

Marc Talcott — Mon, 26 May 2008 04:19:00 GMT

We'll soon have a new section on the site to list tennis coaches and their contact information. A sample page is located at http://www.tennispulse.org/TennisCoaches/TennisCoachList.aspx, and this will become the permanent page.

So if you need to find a tennis coach, now you know where to do that. This should be completed sometime in June 2008.

Memorial Day Weekend 2008

Marc Talcott — Sun, 25 May 2008 23:02:00 GMT

I haven't had much to write about lately but figure I should post so poeple know that I care about this site and that it is active.

With may coming to an end, we've gotten well over 200 new members this month and are currently sitting on the cusp of 100 accepted challenges. I hope and I'm sure that one day these numbers seem small but for now they are great little landmarks that I watch with great enthusiasm.

Tennis related: Been playing in several leagues and I have played 3 of the last 4 days. My feet hurt like hell right now, but I hope to find someone to play with tomorrow and hit the courts again. Good thing that I know how to find a tennis partner on TennisPulse.org

Oh, and is anyone watching the French Open at Roland Garros. I just watched Serena Williams beat Harkleroad. I wish we had red clay courts like that around here. I'd like to play on it once.

New stuff on TennisPulse.org

Marc Talcott — Wed, 14 May 2008 05:34:00 GMT

We've added a little 'Tennis Pulse Stats' gadget that tells you how many players we now have, the number of challenges issued, and the number accepted. Ok, so it won't change your life, but I thought it was pretty cool to see that we've matched up 80 tennis matches so far. I suspect that the true number is much higher, but that's how many are officially issued and accepted according to our what we can track.

I'm also working on updating grids in the site, replacing the original brown and tan grids with nicer looking ones. There are other things in line to be done, but I also want to hear any ideas that you have. Feel free to drop me a comment here or use the contact page to pop me a note with your input.

Happy Hitting!

USTA Team - Played singles tonight

Marc Talcott — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 03:40:00 GMT

Tonight I played #2 singles for our 3.0 USTA Team. It was great. First of all, I played against James, who I played a lot of doubles with through the winter when we played indoors, and I think this was the first time I've even seen him for over a month. When I found out I was going to be playing against him, I was pretty psyched. Not only do I get along well with him, but I feel like I was the slightly stronger player. At least it seemed that way when we played doubles, just a month or so ago. What I didn't take into account was the fact that every time I've played with James in the past, he was always somewhat tired because he always played a match right before we played, so I've always seen the worn down James.

So the first set started out right. I think I won the first 3 games, which is almost my typical pattern, even on my recent losing streak. Then true to my pattern, I got tired, or lazy, or whatever, and my game went to crap for a while. Meanwhile James was waking up,and he quickly caught up. Then we had a very good match, which I barely scraped out a win with 7-5,4-6,1-0. Our 10 pt tie break was tight to, but i won that 10-8.

Very nice match. Good night.

Finally back...

Marc Talcott — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 04:43:00 GMT

Well I finally had a win. Granted it was a doubles match. Mixed doubles. My partner Peggy had to carry me because of my sorry ass 2nd serves that caused me to double fault about 5 times today. Granted the female on the other side was probably a 2.0 player.

All in all it was good. It was fun, we won. I just need to work on my second serves. I know my problem. If I miss my first serve, then I try to hit softer, but I think too much about how much power to use and I slow my arm down waaaay too much, so my second serve is goes about 30 MPH into the net. Very immasculating. I should just hit the $%!* out of it since I'm going to fault it any way. No really I need to go practice a second serves.

Anyway, atleast I got one win in. Thanks to Peggy.

Where's my game?

Marc Talcott — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 04:02:00 GMT

I'd really like to be writing some insightfuly post about how I improved my game and played an awesome match tonight. Instead, I'm wondering why I've lost every single match I've played for the last 3 weeks (geez has it really been 3 weeks? yes, yes it has), with the exception of one doubles match we won.

First I need to make i clear that I'm a 3.0, been playing a lot for about 6 months now, but I consider myself solid 3.0. Ok, so I played a 3.5 two weeks ago and he beat me. That's fine, a 3.5 should beat me (6-2, 6-0). The other matches have been outside of www.TennisPulse.org and so they aren't listed there, but the scores are similarly bad. I've been playing other players that I'd consider equal to me, not better, yet the same pattern seems to repeat. The first 4 games are usually tight 2-2, and then I go to sleep. Maybe I'm just out of shape and get exhausted after 4 games.

Tonight I was just so freaking lethargic I didn't even come alive until I was down 6-2, 5-0, and I then played one really strong game,and then collapsed in exhaustion for a final 6-2, 6-1.

I hope things turn around soon.

Cat wounds healing

Marc Talcott — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 07:11:00 GMT

Today I went back to the doctor for a follow up from my cat attack. Seems like things are looking good and I just need to finish the antibiotics and if it doesn't get worse then I guess I won't need surgery. It doesn't hurt or bother me any more, but the tetanus shot I got and all the antibiotics have had me feeling like I've had the flu. I never had a tetanus shot that made my entire body ache like this, but I assume that is what is causing this.

Well, the good news for me is that I can play tennis again. The doc had told me not to originally as it may make my hand swell and hurt and I assume make it harder to diagnose if I had an infection issue. And honestly I've felt so crappy I wouldn't have played anyway for the past few days. I'm about ready to hit the courts again though.

A new day at TennisPulse.org

Marc Talcott — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 17:35:00 GMT

After just a few weeks of running the www.TennisPulse.org website to help tennis players of all levels find other tennis players of comparable skills and arrange tennis matches, it seems like a good idea to setup a forums area where we can get some 2 way communication going on. So I'm busy working on setting all this up. I'll probably fumble through some of this and if you want to suggest something, go ahead and do it right here for now.

When cats attack.

Marc Talcott — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 07:39:00 GMT

So yesterday around 3pm, I was trying to work on the site and looked out the window to see my cat cornered on the back porch by my mom's dog, a big german shepard with a healthy appetite for anything that will run, and I decided I better go save my cat.

I walked out there very calmly and picked up the cat who was arched up, frozen, and trying not be be seen by the dog 2 feet way drooling over the thought of tasting fresh cat meat. I picked up Spooky, and took a step towards the house with her as Tasha jumped up at her.

So picture me holding a savage wild cat that is kicking, clawing, biting, scratching, and screaming, as I'm trying to kick back the german shepard. This is not going well at all.... I finally drop Spooky because she's shredding meat off my hand and arm, and I try to grab the dog to stop her from chasing the cat. That didn't work any better than holding the cat.

Cut to 5 seconds later, and Spooky is 30 feet up in a tree, with a dog circling and, me still standing on the deck, dumbfounded, and thinking, "Why didn't I just hook a leash on the dog and lead her away, instead of grabbing the cat?"

12 hours later (3am), I'm arriving at the emergency room because the cat bite on my hand is red, swollen, and looking like I was stung by a few bees. The first ER doctor that saw me was telling me it looked really bad and I was probably going to have to have surgery right away because of how nasty cat bite infections eat into your tendons and joints, and this is really bad because it is on a hand with lots of joints and little bones. He called in a orthopedic hand surgeon specialist. This guy shows up and tells me I won't need surgery tonight, but rather a IV of antibiotics and a full course of antibiotics to take of the coming week, and a follow up appt in a few days. As long as it doesn't get worse, no surgery is required.

So now, its 2pm the next day. Its a little more swollen, a little redder, but I don't think this is what he meant about getting worse. I think its ok for now. Oh I need to go get my script filled for my pills.

Out!