One or Two or Three Things (won't know how many until I finish)

1) Happy birthday to my wonderful sister-in-law. Kim, you are one of my favorite people on this planet. Mark is an amazinginly fantastic guy and deserves nothing but the best, and I'm very happy that you two found each other because I feel exactly the same way about you.
I'd have posted that on your Facebook wall where you are more likely to see it, but I haven't been on Facebook in a couple of weeks and see no reason to mess with the streak. Besides, putting it on the blog makes it official in Kevindom, whereas everything on Facebook- while permanent- is still unofficial.

2) Happy half-birthday Jillian! You are a rascally sweetie and I love you dearly.

3) And I love Erin dearly, too, and/or though she is not as rascally as her little sister.

4) All the most important stuff is out of the way. Here is the unimportant stuff.
A) I learned to make outlines, with numbered headings and lettered subheadings, way, way back in 7th or 8th or 9th grade, so I'm doing it now. Subheading 'A,' which, doesn't really fit in anywhere but is instead only devoted to this notion I had about outlining my notes, and which is extremely prolonged and not brief and concise as notes should be, and thus is not at all a good illustration of the art of good note-taking and which is in fact an example of very poor performance in this area, should be ignored.
B) I hit a few golf balls today. I did so yesterday, too. I'm still lousy, but my extended time away has given me hope that I may improve again. I strike the ball much better than I did a year or two ago. That doesn't surprise me, really. I went from decent to lousy very quickly, and then I couldn't find anything close to a decent swing again. I thought some time away might help, and it seems it has.
C) We won tonight, putting the Yogis back over .500. That's our Monday/Wednesday team. What's amazing to me is that we are now 4 and 0 without our starting shortstop. He is arguably our best player. He's a great guy, hits well, fields well, does everything right. And individually he is having a fantastic season. 1 error maximum and he's batting about .600. So I have no idea how we are 4-o without him and 2 and 5 with him. Makes no sense to me. But that won't prevent me from reminding him of it.

I played 3 innings tonight and benched myself to get playing time for someone else. Too much of that this year. I keep saying it's going to stop, because I want (and deserve) to be in the lineup, but I keep doing it. I also batted leadoff. We've not hit at all, needed to shake things up, and so when Chris suggested it I said sure. I walked to start the game, then lined out. So, good enough. And I played good defense.

But we were down 12-3 after 5 and a half innings(all 3 of our runs in my leadoff first inning, thank you) and I had removed myself from the game. I was coaching 3rd, we were lifeless and seemed destined for defeat. I shouted everything I'm supposed to- encouragement, instruction, etc., and acted like we were in the game, but we really weren't, I thought. Then we got a few hits, I waved a few runners around, held a few, and after the inning I glanced at the scoreboard and it was 12-9. Not so bad.
Then we scored 3 in the 7th- timely hitting, an error, and some smart, agressive baserunning, and it was 12-12, but we left the winning run on 3rd.
They again didn't score in the 8th, and we won it with a couple of huge hits.
It was nice. We needed a couple of innings like that. Snuck up on me, though. We started hitting great just when I least expected it.

I started a 2nd blog a couple months ago. There's absolutely nothing on it, so providing a link to it is unimportant. If I ever put anything on there I'll let you know.

I only mention it for one reason. I logged in and provided a long mid-June softball update (entry titled, imaginatively "Mid-June Softball Update"). I'd guess it was about 300 words. I finished it, hit "publish" and then looked at it, and saw that it was on my unused blog.
No problem, i thought. I just copied everything, deleted the post, and then signed in to this blog to paste it. When I pasted this was the sum total of the paste:

Mid

Doesn't seem like much, does it?

I'm not retyping the whole thing, so I'll provide only the very barest highlights.
Yogis Monday/Wednesday: so far we've alternated between very good and very bad, with nothing in between. I expect we'll be okay this year but not great.
I'm personally having my best year ever, but I attribute it partially to luck. I can keep it up, but I'll need to play better the rest of the year just to get the same results.

Sunday: we aren't very good, but it seems like a fairly fun team.
I'm not sure how Ron and I got so stupid. We played for free on a good team, had no worries, just showed up and played. But this year we decided to enter our own team, we have to pay, we spend weekends trying to scrounge up enough players, and the team is not as good.
But it is fun. And I get to play with my brother. I've never played on any team with Brian before, and I really enjoy it. Plus he's done a darned good job pitching so far.

NC 17, Graphic violence. No adult language, but it would have been justified.

We'll start the story slowly, with some background info...

Last Wednesday night we were filling out our lineup and realized we were short a shortstop. We had plenty of bodies, the other nine spots were covered fine, but we really had no true shortstop. It looked like the job might be mine. I had already heard opinions to that effect, and I didn't like it. I'm a capable fielder, but I'm not a shortstop. I don't have the requisite lateral mobility.

So what to do? I looked around, saw Chad, who was penciled in as our left center fielder and who, as far as I know, had never played shortstop. I said "Chad, will you play short?"
He was reluctant, but willing. Especially after I reasoned with him. I did so by telling him it was either him or me, and that it wasn't going to be me. Chad understood the sound reasoning behind that argument.

He had one objection. He wasn't wearing a cup. A valid point, you may say.

I had a ready response. I don't wear one. None of our other infielders wear one. I asked around. It's true. Chad, I said, I've been playing infield for Yogis since the mid 90's and I've never taken a ball in the 'sweet spot,' so to speak. Never. (FORESHADOWING, for those of you scoring this story at home)

Cut to Sunday, second game of doubleheader...

Our hero (me) takes a solid ground ball squarely to Mr. Right Nut. He gamely scoops it (the ball, not Mr. Right Nut) back up and gets a force out at 2nd base. Then he starts sweating, and moaning quietly to himself, and noticing he's got cold chills and the temperature seems to have dropped 30 degrees in seconds. He (me, I'm still talking about, just in case you're confused) grits it out and, thankfully, the third out arrives quickly and our injured hero can return to the bench.

What an ache!!! Goodness, I've never felt anything so painful. I've been hit there before. Who hasn't? But that was a solid shot, no holds barred. Playing ball I've had a broken nose, broken fingers, dislocated thumb, and all sorts of assorted pulled muscles and bloodied body parts. But if given a choice, I don't hesitate for a second to say I'd rather suffer all of those at once than another direct hit like that.

Thank you for listening. Just talking about it helps a lot. Is there a co-pay?

My relationship with Facebook is love/hate, with most of the emphasis on hate. It can be pretty cool sometimes, but it comes with a lot of baggage.

I share only a very limited amount of my personal information on the site. It just doesn't seem safe at all. And now I think I have proof that Facebook gathers, receives, and shares
plenty of my personal information. Not that I really needed proof, since it's not really a secret, but still.

Anyway, here's the deal. The little spot on the side of the page that shows friend suggestions keeps offering Lena as a possible friend. I thought this was usually a result of having mutual 'friends.' But I ran through her list of Facebook friends and we don't appear to have a single Facebook friend in common.
So why the friend suggestion? I have to believe the only possible reason is all of our shared mutual history- addresses, credit info, names on bills, etc. None of that info is on Facebook, but I have to believe it's been assimilated somewhere and somehow for Facebook to use.
There is only one logical explanation: the Facebook corporate devils are planning to take over the world. Thus, I must enter virtual Facebook and defeat my profile at a game of Yahtzee.
(that's a South Park reference, so if you haven't seen the episode don't strain yourself trying to figure out the nonsense.)

Derby handicapping update

I switched horses. Again. My Derby favorites this year have been plentiful, even though my top choices haven't really been getting beat. I've gone from Mucho Macho Man to Dialed In to Archarcharch to Dialed In again to Archarcharch again to Stay Thirsty to.... Soldat.

If you're looking for a winner, I'd advise either Mucho Macho Man or Dialed In. The reason is simple; I put a $2 win bet on the each of the other 3 horses I've liked, but not Mucho Macho Man and Dialed In. So one of them will probably win.

I didn't like seeing Uncle Mo scratched because I've never been impressed with that horse. I wanted him in the race at about 5 to 1, driving up the odds on whoever I liked.

I finally settled on Soldat for my traditional $2 WPS wager on my official, braggers' rights Derby bet because he's one of the few who's been consistently excellent (minus FL), because he'll be up front and likely out of traffic and probably not have a breakneck pace, and because he appears set to go off at odds in the neighborhood of 20-1. That's good odds for a horse when the best he's shown so far is at least as good as or better than all the others.

In what is becoming a Derby Eve tradition, I made Derby bets, including exacta and trifecta, and bets on the first 4 races since I have to work for a while tomorrow. Rotten timing for our busiest time of year.

In what is becoming a Derby Day tradition, I'll bring my racing form and program to work to check out races 5, 6, and 7, so I should be very productive.

Rather than wait until the last minute...

I'll let you know early. After running over 27 million race simulations on my computer program ( that was a lie), crunching all the numbers ( a few of the numbers, and not really understanding them), doing hours of painstaking research (actually, just browsing Bloodhorse.com a couple of times to see what Steve Haskins thought), and consulting countless experts (I asked a guy at work "Who do you like?"), I am prepared to reveal the 2011 Kentucky Derby winner.


and the winner is... "Stay Thirsty, my friends"

Why? Couple of reasons.
First, I do like the way he runs. I've watched all the Derby preps on youtube and Stay Thirsty seems to be able to shift gears pretty well and really turn on the speed. I like that in a crowded Derby field, and of the several horses who I think can do it he is likely to have the best odds.
Second, and most important, by selecting Stay Thirsty I could make a reference to the Dos Equis guy, otherwise known as The Most Interesting Man in the World. "Sharks have a week devoted to him." Also, "he can speak French, in Russian."

There are several other horses I like. Archarcharch, Mucho Macho Man, Midnight Interlude, and Pants On Fire, and probably about five more. In fact, I almost went with Mucho Macho Man, and if the name I keep mistakenly calling him- Super Macho Man- were in fact his correct name, I might have selected him instead so I could have used this Punchout picture.



Speaking of names, I was looking at the Oaks draw and thinking I really didn't like the name St. Johns River. A few minutes later I realized it was because St. John Rivers is the name of the dull and (to me) very unlikeable missionary cousin of Jane Eyre. Then, a few minutes after that, I realized that having favorite and least favorite characters in Jane eyre probably means I'm a nerd. Oh well.
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Favorite? Rochester, of course. Though that creepy Grace Pool rocks, too.