You've know you have been reffing amatuer players too long when...

you go and casually talk to an U12 boys player regarding his outburst to both ARs throughout the match (Jesse could take it, but wasn't sure on the other referee) and then an outburst towards me while others were taking shots on a goal and he's to the brink of crying. Didn't raise my voice, but I was stern. Jesse told me he thinks I made him cry. It was a good game, Mustang I had the distinct pleasure of watching them practice corner kicks the Thursday before and doing it quite well. So when it turned out I reffed them, I knew they were going to be deadly on corners which they were.

My AR assignment wasn't so much fun because I had a center I thought was too assertive and basically made enemies with the coaches. It was due to a time dispute on the program. I would have explained the same thing, but I wouldn't have been as stern about it. Basically could have been a better game. This same referee over asserted himself on another game and as one coach put it, "I've seen him referee and he is a good referee, but it's center ref, not center stage." I had to agree a little bit, but then again, I heard they were jerks and Jesse even told me the coach as an ass.

Nobody pulled a red card that day, but I know I was flirting with it on my final game on Saturday. It was Fair Oaks vs. Northwest Oaks. I booked two players on Fair Oaks in the first 5 minutes. My buddy Mike told me that he looked over at my game, saw me hit the whistle hard and pull a yellow card. Then he heard quiet from the rest of the game. Well it may have been quiet to him, but I had to stay on them to keep them from doing anything else stupid. 00 of Fair Oaks apparently had a hard time keeping his mouth shut and his teammates knew this because they were telling him to shut up. I went to him and said, "If you know what is good for you, you will shut your mouth as you already have a card." Coach took that one under advisement because he pulled both players off that I had booked. He came to me at half time and said while I was doing a good job, I got in the face of the players and that didn't defuse them. He's a ref too...blah blah blah. Rest of the game went fine and I was red card free for Saturday.

Had a few beers and pizza with the old crew I hadn't seen together in a while.