Caution: The following account of my weekend can lead to partial paralysis and numbness of the lower extremities.

Rain. And how.

Up early Saturday morning to take Boy for his final soccer game of the spring season. All dressed up, get his junk bag and water bottle and head out to Liberty Park. All the rain from the preceding days had made all the grass real pretty and green, but their fields don’t drain well and the whole place wound up like a peat bog. What a stinking slippery mess. Like playing in Teflon-coated axle grease. Good game though—the boys played very hard and wound up tieing 1-all. Jonathan got stepped on once, which made him limp around and moan some, but later on he got going and managed to bash himself in the head a couple of times (on purpose!) with the ball. He had a good time, and didn’t get incredibly dirty. However, the kid who likes to slide down for no apparent reason looked like he had been hydroseeded.

Pictures, then up to the van, where I made Little Stinky change into his clean uniform, then it was Part Two of our adventure, in which I got to hotfoot it downtown in order to take Oldest’s baritone clarinet to have a pad put on it. ::sigh:: “I DON”T KNOW HOW IT CAME OFF! I WAS JUST PLAYING AND IT CAME OFF!”

Uh-huh.

“REALLY!! I mean, my finger got under there while I was playing, but MY TEACHER SAYS IT WAS MY FAULT!!”

Uh-huh.

“SHE HATES ME!”

Uh-huh.

Oldest has tryouts for symphonic band today. Much like the tryouts for volleyball which she could not sign up for because unknown hateful people removed the signup list BEFORE SHE COULD SIGN IT, and much like the unknown hateful people who somehow managed to break into her gym locker without a trace and STEAL HER GLASSES, once again mysterious persons unknown had conspired to DENY HER THE RIGHT TO TRY OUT FOR BAND by screwing up her clarinet. Seems to be a running theme of trying to cover up for potential disappointment by consciously or unconsciously sabotaging herself. Maybe it’s some sort of vast right-wing conspiracy. She certainly seems to have much less difficulty believing that than maybe that she might have pried on the key pad just a little too hard with her fingernail, and maybe if she had not been messing with it, it would still be in one piece…

Nah, couldn’t be.

In any event, from Jonathan’s game I had to go to Nuncie’s to see if they could fix it. Walked in, took it back to the Band Aid room (heh—funny guys) and they fellow said I could pick it up Monday. HE’S PART OF THE CONSPIRACY, TOO!! Told him we needed it Monday morning, and asked if there was anything I could do as a temporary fix with stickum. He got sort of a pained look on his face and went and got another guy from the back. “Hmm. Never seen a pad come apart like that before.” Yes, my friend, and you’re not likely ever to again—he said he would give it a try, so Boy and I looked around. Wonderful place—they’ve been around for a while, and have a ton of autographed memorabilia and stuff all crammed in with the instruments—fifteen minutes of playing with stuff while simultaneously telling Jonathan to leave stuff alone (“But Daddy, YOU’RE touching it!” “Yes, and when you’re forty, you’ll be able to bother your little boy.”)—and we were ready to go. The fixer-upper guy was impressed with himself, and I was, too.

Off to T’ville, where we were supposed to a) go by the store and get hot dog buns and drinks for Catherine’s postseason party, b) get Boy stuff for his party at school, c) get him into something not full of black mud, and d) get back to the soccer park in time for Cat’s game at noon.

Clothes—check. Processed white bread—check. Two big jugs of carbonated water—check. Off to park.

Got there and they were already well into the game with a bunch of little girls wearing orange jerseys. I plopped down in my chair and Reba filled me in on the progress to that point, and she told me that the opposing coach was the same one who Catherine’s team had played in the fall that ran the score up to 20-1 and who had gotten into a verbal smackdown with our coach.

A real prince of a fellow.

Moderate height, reflective bug-eye sunglasses, body by Soloflex, hiking boots, and with his buzzcut he had a mug exactly like Jim Carrey’s in Me, Myself & Irene. And the sparkling personality of a cross between Jim Carrey as the insane Hank, and the most obnoxious [insert name of most hated Southeastern Conference football rival] fan you could find.

This old world needs all types, I suppose, but some types are more appropriate for coaching little six year old girls, and some would be better off being crushed by falling scrap iron. Shouting at the kids, mouthing off at the fans, mouthing off at the referee...he was the type of jackass we around here describe as “so sorry he ain’t worth killing.”

As I was telling our coach after it was over, his behavior was reprehensible, and he doesn’t need to be coaching little kids. BUT the best revenge is winning.

Which we did, 5-1.

In your face, burrhead.

Off to the party, which featured a moonwalk, squealing kids, wieners, cake, a moonwalk, cake, hot dogs, squealing kids, and another approaching thunderstorm. ::sigh:: We stayed as long as we could, then swept up our crew and headed to Rebecca’s last game, once more in the soggy goo at Liberty Park.

In between Boy’s morning game and this one, it had rained a few more bucketsful, and a bunch more folks had played, so by the time we got there the surface was basically thick chunky black water. The other team jumped out to a quick 1-0 lead which held to near the end of the first half, when they got called for a hand ball down inside the box. We got a direct penalty kick, which went blasting like a tank round over the goalie’s head and under the crossbar, very nearly ripping out the back of the net. My little girl has quite a leg on her, you know.

She was overjoyed. She’s been real close all year and has had several assists, but only managed to get one other goal. I think this one meant just as much as the first one. Her mama and daddy and big sister and little brother and little sister sure seemed proud about it. They were very loud, but you know how they are.

The girls went on to score another goal against a tough, tough team, thus winding up the season 7-0-1. Good job, girls!

Got Bec washed off a bit and into her spare uniform so as not to muck up the Honda, then it was off again to the house. We got parked and started unloading, and then I heard it, faintly, then louder, then faint again…

mmmwwwWWWUUUPaaaaaaa, wwwHHHUPPaaaaaa, eeeeeeeiiiiIIIIIUPPaaaaaaaa

It was at that moment that I discovered that we are just in ear distance of the new Barber racecourse. I am truly blessed. Although I didn’t get to go to the races this weekend, at least now I can rest easy knowing that I can at least hear them race if I can’t go. Add to this that we are also within earshot (so to speak) of the Birmingham Police Department firing range with its occasional full-auto training exercises, and the fact that there’s a Norfolk-Southern rail line running at the foot of the hill, and, well…it’s just overwhelming—like having your own full size slot car track and Lionel train set and GI Joe Commando Play Set. And they’re all far enough away that it’s not too loud, thus damping down the curmudgeonly old-fart side of me which wishes for QUIET and for them danged kids to hush up.

Anyway, kids inside, kids get baths and hair washed, kids go to bed, then it’s Sunday.

Of a different sort. Ashley took the ACT exam as part of the Duke University TIPS program, and out of the 3,200 or so students in Alabama who took it, around 900 scored well enough to get to go to a special honor program down at the University of Alabama.

No jokes about visiting enemy territory, please. Although I went to Auburn, I still enjoy visiting Tuscaloosa and was excited for Oldest to get some recognition. But first, we had to get down there—since it was at noon, there was no time to go to church here, so we got up early and hit the road so we could visit down there and then have time to make the ceremony. Luckily the congregation we visited had an early service, so we stopped in for a while. (Oh, and by the way, it rained all the way down.)

Interesting building—they have a large multipurpose space with moveable chairs which doubles as a gym. Sometimes rooms like this work, but most of the time they wind up not being fish nor fowl—not reverent enough to make a really contemplative space to worship, too nice to really be a good gym. You don’t want big rubber kickball marks all over the wall behind the preacher, and the stage makes for a real obstacle when you have to chase a ball out of bounds. But that’s just me—in this case they erred a bit more toward the nice side, and if there hadn’t been sports markings on the carpet, it would have looked like any other large room. Nicely furnished and painted and reasonably good acoustics, and a cool projection system so you didn’t have to fumble with songbooks.

The only thing really distracting were the two middle-aged women sitting in front of me who talked nearly the entire service. Announcements—chatting amiably. First couple of songs—chatter and sing. Prayer—bow, then start up blabbering at the exact moment the ‘n’ stopped on the ‘Amen’. Communion—bow, chat, eat, chat, bow, chat, chuckle, drink, chat. Next songs—chat, compare stuff in purses, jabber, yammer, giggle. Sermon—eyes on podium, chat out side of mouth. Chatter.

The people in front of them kept turning around, someone down the row cleared his throat in the “I’m making this sound so that you will notice me and possibly think that maybe other people might be distracted by the fact that you won’t shut up except to take a breath, and with no small amount of embarrassment you might take this opportunity to zip it” sort of manner. To no avail. I realize my kids can be distracting, but even they don’t get this bad. Of course, maybe these two ladies just needed me to pinch a plug out of the underside of their arm.

Afterwards, we went and got some brunch at one the South’s finest purveyors of greasy starches, the Shoney’s on McFarland.

For reasons that still have not become clear to me, Reba’s dad, whose sinus problems are legend, did not ask for a seat in the non-smoking section. Meaning that after our very enjoyable meal we smelled like an ashtray. I was on the end of the table beside a booth of four hefty Druid Citizens who all spoke with a charming brogue equal parts phlegm and burlap, who all seemed determined to each finish a pack of smokes before the waitress could bring the check.

Again, it takes all sorts, I suppose.

After getting our fill of the smooth, tasty goodness of second hand smoke and consuming mass quantities of food designed specifically to anger PETA, it was time to head over to Coleman Coliseum. Ashley found her place down on the floor and we squished ourselves down in the chairs and waited for a while for the show to start. When it did, there was a nice introduction from one of the guys who works with the TIPS program, and then there was the main speaker. A nice youngish fellow who was a dead ringer for Darrin Number One.

A very nice man, I'm quite sure.

He gave a speech in which he compared the “Generation Y” (please make your own air quotes) kids down on the floor with their “Generation X” (again, your own exaggerated air quotes, please) parents in the stands. Now, looking around I would say that most of the parents in the audience were at the tail end of the Baby Boom generation but I won’t quibble with that. I would like to ask that in the future though, for the sanity of all who follow me, that the entire textbook-length listing of supposed generational differences between parents and children—as compiled by ‘many noted experts’, and ‘socialogical consultants’, and others of the sort who couldn’t find their butts with both hands—somehow be shortened.

Two of these things is somewhat instructive and mildly amusing. But running through an entire matrix full of anthropological claptrap is pushing it, bub.

“How many of you know what an “Em—PEE—threeeee” is? Oh, several—in fact, MANY of you know what an “Em—Pee—THREE” is. And what is it? Yes, that’s correct, it is a TYPE OF COMPUTER MUSIC that you can “down load” from the “Internet”. And now, I’m going to ask your parents if THEY know what an “Emm—PEE—three” is…Parents?”

EVERYONE KNOWS WHAT AN MP-3 IS YOU GIANT DORK!! SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP AND GET ON WITH THIS THING BEFORE I UNBOLT THIS STADIUM CHAIR AND RAM IT UP...

A smattering of the parents who had not slipped into a coma raised their hands.

“I seeee!”

Another—“How many of you “kids” enjoy working in groups, as opposed to working on a project individually?” (Said with negative emphasis on “individually”.)

About a quarter raised their hands.

I leaned over and told Reba that these were the ones who never got stuck on a team of five in which four were burnt-out slackers with negative GPAs.

Of course, the reaction of the kids goes against accepted wisdom—that being that the New Generation enjoys working on problems collectively and by reaching consensus and by empowering group members and all that goobledygook—so he just went on as if the entire group raised their hands. Wow, nothing like being educated beyond your wisdom.

Anyway, this went on long enough for me to take a nap and for Catherine to have to go to the pot two more times, and then they finally got to the point where the kids got to go get their award. It was very nice and formal, and no one fell or goofed around. Thus done, they all got a nice round of applause and we went down and took some photos, and then headed back home.

Through the rain.

The rest of the afternoon was blessedly uneventful, although rainy.

And then it was time to get up and start another week—so there you go.
posted by Terry at 2:57:00 PM