Friday, May 6, 2005 - That Rascally Rabbit and His Tales of T-Ball

Rascal began his first "real" sport today (what? I waited until he was 5 before getting him involved in such things?! oh, no, now he'll never become a professional sports star! *snort*). The glorious, magnificent sport of T-ball! Ah, fond memories (the ShadowAngel says whist fighting her gag reflex)...

It isn't a league or anything like that - it's entirely an instructional program for 5 and 6-year-olds to teach them the fundamentals of the sport. No real competition. It's a good thing. Ah, I remember those halcyon days as a 6-year-old, being utterly humiliated nearly every time I stepped onto the field {retch}.

Oh, sorry about that. If you haven't guessed, I don't miss my Little League days one bit. But since I think the skills are something good for a child to develop, and maybe, just maybe, he'll like the game, Rascal is in it.

I watched him. He was the kid who stares off into space, not paying one bit of attention to the coaches. The kid whose name the coaches learn first because they have to say it so often. "Rascal...Rascal...Rascal!!" The kid who, when it is his turn to run around the bases (after watching 3 other kids do it before him), runs to 1st base and then into the middle of the field. When the coach was teaching the kids how to hit, he told them to point their toes towards a nearby building. Yup, mine's the kid who picks his foot up into the air and points it at the building. The coach tells the kids to run and retrieve their baseballs. Yup, mine's the kid who slowly meanders into the field, doesn't pick up his baseball, but calmly picks out two new balls from the bucket sitting in the field.

I'm beginning to believe it's hopeless. He'll be as athletically incompetent as his parents were when they were young. But at least he's getting good at chess...

Of course, in fairness to Rascal, he was trying hard. And he also had the misfortune of having to use a tee that was broken so that he was having a hard time putting his ball on it. I'd get frustrated by that too.

So we'll have to see how it all works out. I don't care if he's any good at it; I just want him to have fun.

Wednesday, May 4, 2005 - Warning: Brag Alert

I'm going to brag and boast now, so if you don't care for that sort of thing, please stop reading now.

I went to tae kwon do last night. As you know, I successfully navigated my belt test last week, so I received my promotion to green stripe last night. But there was another treat! Much to my surprise, I was awarded a trophy for best poomse (the solo form, equivalent to a kata in karate)! I was totally stunned, in part because I couldn't imagine deserving such an award, and also because in the 4 1/2 months I have been there I have not seen a trophy awarded except for the usual "Student of the Month." I am honored to be recognized by Grandmaster Chong.

Who'da thunk it? Li'l' ol' overweight out-of-shape uncoordinated me? But from what I heard from of other students, they were not surprised by my receiving the award. Tres cool!

OK, that's enough bragging. Back to the mundane.

I finally got my sister's wedding cake thing settled. During the weekend I visited a bakery that had done my baby shower cake way back when. I walked into their shop, gazing at all the delectable goodies and took a look at a number of wedding cakes they had out on display.

And then I walked right back out of the shop without speaking to anyone. Beautiful, incredible cakes! At...atrocious prices. The prices were all about double what I was looking for.

So, feeling somewhat defeated, I began to drive home, and then I thought of a bakery that I had never been to that is several blocks from my home. Worth a try, right? Well, I stopped by and talked with them, and apparently this bakery had purchased most of the equipment that the original bakery (that went out of business a couple weeks ago) and had also received much of that bakery's business? What a bit of serendipity! I placed a order for the same cake at the same price. Life is beautiful, and I'm glad to get that off my plate.

Yay! It's date night! It's been a long time since I've had a date night because Ironwolf has been gone so much the last couple months. He's a little miffed that I have this incredible talent for picking out expensive restaurants. Haw haw haw that's the price you pay for not taking me out more often buddy!

I think I'm much happier now putting up a few posts per week rather than feeling pressed to put up an entry every day. So that's good! But I *still* haven't gotten back to my blog reading yet. So that's bad! I guess I'll have to pare it down to my favored 6 or 8 and get caught up. Soon. Really.

BTW, a happy 4th birthday to my niece, little B!