Congratulations Never Come Too Late

Barb got home to a message on the answering machine from a old friend and neighbour. The friend wanted to congratulate Barb for winning a medal in Pickleball. Barb had won the medal in August. However, her friend had only found out about it in October because Barb's name was in the local newspaper.

Our neighbour down the street also stopped Barb when she was going to the mailbox. He wanted to congratulate her too.

Barb found the article in the newspaper. The title of the article was “Pair Wins Gold”. It didn't even mention pickleball in the title. You had to read the details in the small article to find out who and what they won. Barb was impressed with her neighbours' close reading of the local newspaper.

Like a Dog in the Car

I was living on the edge for many years with my glasses. I only had one pair. If they broke, I wouldn't be able to see. This was particularly dangerous in Florida.

So I was determined to get a new pair of glasses before we left for Florida this winter. I got my eyes checked They gave me a new prescription for trifocals. I also bought transitions.

When I picked up my glasses, they told me that even though the glasses were transitions, they might not become dark enough to drive with because of the tinted windows in the car. I might also need to buy sunglasses to put over them.

I went for a walk in the afternoon soon after I got the glasses. It was sunny outside. The transitions worked great. Everything was so clear. There was no squinting necessary.

Barb and I were driving a few days later. Barb noticed that the transitions were not very dark in the car. Barb told me to open the window and look out to see if the glasses would get dark. So I opened the window. I then stuck my head out the window like a dog. We were driving down the highway. Barb thought this was very funny.

Crystal Quilters

Barb was finally giving up the Barrhaven Tennis Club treasurer job after 15 years. So she had to give the treasurer's computer to the new treasurer.

We had been using the computer for quite a few years as a home computer. So Barb asked me to clean it up. To remove the personal files and the special programs that I had installed.

As I was uninstalling the programs, I noticed a program called Microsoft Works. I immediately remembered that Barb had received a file from a lady in Florida with the email addresses and phone numbers of all of the quilters at Crystal Lake where we live in Florida.

She could not open the file because it was written in Microsoft Works. Microsoft Works was incompatible with everything we had. I guess it was a special program that comes with the Microsoft Vista operating system.

I was able to finally open the file. I was able to re-save it as a Microsoft Word file. Barb was very happy to finally have the email addresses and phone numbers of the Crystal Quilters.

A Big Round Head

Barb knitted Sarah a beret for winter. Unfortunately, when she was finished it she thought it would be too small for Sarah's big round head.

However, Barb thought she could stretch it. She sprayed it with a little water. Then she got a volleyball. She stretched the beret over the volleyball for a day or two.

When Barb gave it to Sarah at Thanksgiving, it fit perfectly.

Sportsmanship Award Nomination

One of my fastball teams, nominated me for the sportsmanship award this season. I didn't win but I thought it was nice to be nominated.

Co-op Confusion

Sarah was very busy when she got back to school after Labour Day. She had all of the classes. She also had to look for a co-op job for the winter. She was sending out tons of resumes with individually written cover letters for each one.

Third year was so different from second year. She was getting all kinds of interviews. If she had to go to all these interviews, she would miss a lot of classes.

She had also just changed from Biological Engineering Co-op to Environmental Engineering Co-op. So she had a lot to do to arrange that too.

She had originally thought that the environmental engineers were all flakes. By third year, all of the flakes had dropped out. So that was no longer an issue. She didn't like biological engineering because all of the people in the program were interested in bio-medical work.  She wasn't.

One of her first interviews was with a lady from the Atomic Energy Canada Limited in Chalk River. Sarah didn't even say very much. The lady just talked about how great it would be to have her on the team with her biological background. They liked to have diverse teams. That was good because Sarah didn't know much about the job.

The next day she got an email from the lady saying that she was sorry.  Somehow she had not emailed Sarah the attachment with the information about the job that Sarah was supposed to use to prepare for the interview.

Sarah got the job. So now she doesn't have to look any more or go to any more interview. She was very happy.

It was neat because we know a lot of people from Deep River right next door to Chalk River.  They have winter places in the same park in Florida with us.

Who Am I Kidding?

My two fastball teams were in the playoffs. Both teams were in the semi-finals. One night both teams played on the same night and at the same time. However, one team was facing elimination and the other team was playing their first game of the series.

I went to play in the elimination game. Our best pitcher wasn't there. So we were in trouble. We had three pitchers try to get the other team out.  None of them were any good. We lost the game 19-13. I thought that when you score 13 runs in a game you shouldn't lose. But we did. And we were eliminated.

The next day I had off. I checked my email when I got up.  There was an email from the captain of the team that was still playing. He said that they won the first game but our pitcher hurt himself in the rundown play. He asked me if I would be at the game. He said I would have to pitch. 

I replied that he must be kidding. He said no it was true.

We had won the first game of the best of three series. So the game was not an elimination game. The captain thought that the pitcher might be better by the next game.

When I told Barb that I would have to pitch. She was furious. She said that I was going to get the ball hit back at me. I wouldn't be able to get out the way.  I would be killed. She said it wasn't worth it. We were going to lose anyway. We should just forfeit the game.

Later in the day, I got a phone call from the pitcher. He told me about his injury. He tried to talk it up. He said that if we can score enough runs, we could win the game. I might be okay.

As I was leaving for the game, She asked me if I was really going to pitch. Barb said it was nice knowing me.

 

As I was driving to the game, I thought to myself. Who am I kidding? I am going to get killed. It was stupid to be pitching. These guys were good hitters. Barb was right.

When I got to the game, the teams who had played earlier cheered me on. They called me Ivan "The Terminator" Taylor.

We scored a run in the top of the first inning.

I got the first batter out. Then the second batter hit a triple. The third batter hit a line drive to the second baseman. The second baseman threw to third base to catch the runner off base. But he threw wild. The runner tried to go home. The third baseman fired a strike to the catcher.  The catcher got the runner at home for a double play.  We got out the inning with no runs scored against us.

From then on we never looked back. We scored at least one run in every inning. I walked a lot of batters but we almost always got out of the inning without them scoring. Just one time they hit a based loaded triple and scored three runs.

We won the game 9-3 and were headed to the finals. The guys thought this was the greatest thing they had ever seen.

When I got home Barb said she was surprised to see me.  She was even more surprised when I told her I had won the game.

The president of the league who was watching the game said the next day in an email to the executive that he kept saying to himself that I might get through the batting order once but eventually they would adjust and then poor old Ivan would get hammered. But it never happened.

Our pitcher was back for the finals and we won easily.  We were the league champs.