Thursday, July 14, 2005

Heat Wave, Ball Games & Best Friend Visit

There is so much about Summer that I love. I enjoy getting up in a comparative leisurely fashion in the mornings & letting the kids sleep in. No rushing around getting ready for school, not infrequently concluding in everyone mad as heck. Hopping in the car in 2 seconds and off you go... no coats, boots, mittens. Green, green, everywhere green. Hammock on the porch. Fireflies in the woods. Staying up late to watch TV. Less laundry. Well, that one is cancelled out by more dishes and clutter left by lazy children throughout the day. But, anyway, Summer is so much easier in many ways.

But... if only Summer wouldn't get so darn hot and muggy. Makes sitting at a ball game awful. And we've been doing a lot of that. Sam's team had the first Little League national qualifying tournament this past weekend, starting on Thursday evening, and since they lost that game, Friday, Saturday & Sunday. They won all 3 of those, so we had another game last night. Lost that one. It was a great season, though. Very proud of Sam, and his whole team. Great group of boys.

I wish they could have won, won, won. But I have to admit, my first thought, selfishly, was of relief at not having to sit through 2-3 hours of sauna any more... until next year.

But then, after the game, Sam was invited to play on a team for a tournament this weekend. He was so very excited. Today we bought new lawn chairs made of canvas and mesh material. The plan is that the mesh will breathe so our asses & backs aren't soaked by the end of the game. Anyway, it's nice to have a plan.

At last Thursday evening's game, my best friend, Sandy, and her husband were there with us. They stayed the night with us and left for home (Texas) the next day. Sam was pretty happy to have more fans, especially Aunt Sandy. It was too bad his team lost that game... and they could have won, but it was one of those off nights for them. By the end of the game, close to 9 pm (including a 35-minute delay while the other team and tournament "officials" debated a finer point of Little League rules... ugh... which resulted in the other team's runner on 1st being officially called out, which had absolutely no bearing on the outcome of the game), anyway... there we all were at 9 pm, starving for dinner. Sam cheered up at the prospect of dinner at Red Lobster.

Red Lobster. It's funny, I haven't been there in ages and ages. Years. So many, I don't remember the last time we were there. Some people love it, and some hate it. I'm here to tell ya, the one we went to was excellent. The server was just about the nicest, prettiest and most competent server we've ever had. The food was good. The beer battered perch was excellent. Yum yum.

We were walking into it, and I mentioned that it was years since we'd been, and my wonderful hubby, o he the master of timing, declares, "that's because last time we were here the place stunk and the food was crap." Hmmm...

So with those words ringing in our ears, a portent of a dinner doomed, in we went. Maybe that's why our experience was so wonderful. We were all expecting crap, and instead, lovely ice cold beer, lovely perch brought to our table by a lovely young woman! Oh, sound the harps, please, it was heaven. Take that, Kevin-the-Doomsayer.

During dinner, Brian (Sandy's hubby), remarked that Bisquick had a recipe on the box for the cheesy biscuits like Red Lobster makes, and that one of his favorite things was sausage gravy over those biscuits. The universe was in alignment for sure. I had sausage at home purchased for the express purpose of making sausage gravy and biscuits for breakfast the morning of their visit. And I always have Bisquick in the pantry. Breakfast was darn good.

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