Thankful Thursday

1. Lots of good times spent with friends this past week--dinner with the Vandermeys at Penn Station and walking Shadow with Jayne last night.

2. My nephew-in-law was offered a job this week.

3. My great niece had her 6-month birthday yesterday!!!. Happy half-birthday Emma!!!!!!!  And John Michael had is 15th birthday on Tuesday. How can the wonderful little boy now have a driver's permit?????

4. My car is waxed for the summer.

5. A great week for sports: last weekend was Final Four with men's and women's national basketball championship games. Baseball started yesterday with most games today. The Master's started today.

6. Most importantly--it's Holy Week and Sunday is the greatest day in the Church's yearly calender. He is risen. He is risen indeed.

Texas Rangers

In March 2009 I spent several days in Dallas, TX. In addition to Six Flags, the Textbook Depository, and Fort Worth stockyards, I did a tour of The Ballpark at Arlington, the home of the Texas Rangers.

The tour guide was a little old lady in her late 80s I think. She had been a Rangers fan since they were a minor league team. She knew the players, the stats, and she knew the ballpark. During the season she worked in concessions and souvenirs, and when the team wasn't in town and in the off season she did ballpark tours. She was so proud of the stadium. She literally beamed talking about various players lockers. She thought it was very strategic that the Rangers had better batting cages under the seating than the opponent. It crushed her that the team was putting up advertising in front of the the bullpen. And she giggled when she talked about the Rangers bullpen being air conditioned but the opponents wasn't.

So somewhere in Arlington, TX, a little old lady is finally seeing her dream come true this week: the Rangers in the World Series.

Side story about the Rangers. Josh Hamilton, Rangers outfielder, almost blew his career away due to a drug and alcohol abuse problem. Josh used his strong faith to lead him back to a sober life and his career took off. To respect his alcohol abuse issue, the team sprayed each other with ginger ale rather than champagne when the team won the American League championship Friday night. That says a lot of the respect the team has for him.

I Won, I Won, I Won

I won the men's NCAA tournament bracket in my department at work. Only about half of the people entered, but I stopped a two-year win streak of a co-worker. It all came down to a tie-breaker with her. The final score I guessed had an absolute difference less from the actual score than the score she guessed.

Whatever it takes.

Go Stanford

Think happy Stanford thoughts all day. I am.

Big 10 Tourney

The last 3 1/2 days Renae and I were on our annual trek to a women's basketball tournament--something we've done 8 times in the 10 years we've known each other.

Thursday afternoon we left and did some shopping at the outlet mall in Michigan City. Friday we saw four games. 3 of 4 teams I wanted to win did and 0 of 4 teams that Renae wanted to win did. Last night neither team that we were for won. During each game they had a trivia question about a player from one of the teams playing in that game. I got 5 of 6 questions correct and yep, Renae got zero. Can you tell we are a bit competitive with each other.

We got back just over an hour ago and watch the last 10 minutes or so of the championship game. What a crock. Iowa was called for a foul with 1.9 seconds left and the Ohio State player made both free throws to give OSU the lead and the win. How disappointing.

Now we're watching the SEC championship game. Go Lady Vols!!!

Next year we're going to Duluth for the SEC tournament. Enough of this Big 10!

Olympics

The other night I was watching the Olympics. When I realized that no US athlete was in the women's ski cross I said, "Then I'm for the Canadian to win gold!" To which my friend said, "Oh, you're just sucking up to the mittens."

Chad Hendrick

I'm really enjoying the Winter Olympics this year and really appreciated hearing this from Chad Hendrick.

Sunday Afternoon Blues

I don't really care about Russia v. Czech in hockey at the Olympics and I'm not into the match play golf tournament. Today is the classic example of February being the worst sports month on Sunday afternoons. No football, no March Madness, no baseball, and no hockey playoffs.

My Take on Tiger

Tiger Woods made a public apology today. There’s been a lot of talk about if he needed to publicly apologize and now was his apology sincere.

Yes, he needed to make a public statement. Tiger Woods has the status he does because of the public. If there were no public, he would not have made millions for playing a game. Even if he didn’t try to build an image of being a “good guy” (which he did), he still needs to acknowledge publicly his transgression. He is right that any details of his sordid behavior are between himself and his wife. The press and the public don’t need to know.

Was the apology sincere or too rehearsed? I would like to think he is sincere, but I’m not able to judge his heart—only God can do that. His wife is correct in that his apology to her isn’t in the words he says but in his actions going forward. Too rehearsed and therefore lacking in meaning??? Yesterday I hosted the Finance MBX at work. There are 40-60 people who attend, and I rehearsed my opening comments, introduction, etc. I absolutely understand rehearsing an emotional speech to be made with millions of people watching. I think the guy deserves a pass on this one.

Tiger said the right words: I believed that the rules didn’t apply to me. I am at fault here. I did the wrong thing. He certainly didn’t blame others.

If only he had been like David saying, “Against thee have I sinned,” and not I lost my Buddhist way.

NFL Playoffs

Go Colts!!!

Overtime Work

This is the e-mail I received from my work team leader this morning:


I'm really sorry to have to do this to you, but I have some stuff I need your help with and I'm going to need you to come in on Thursday night from about 8 til 11:30. It's the only time this can be worked on.
I really appreciate your dedication to the team.
Carole




Edited:
Yeah, right; she had me going for a minute and then I remembered there is a big game on Thursday night that she knows I'll be watching. It made for a good laugh in our office today.

This picture says it all.

Nothing More to Say

Football Sunday

I didn't think the Bills vs. the Jaguars would have any interest to me, but strangely it does.

Had to laugh at several of Mike and Mike in the Morning's comments about the 1-8 Cleveland Browns playing at the 1-8 Detroit Lions on Sunday.

They had 8 reasons to go to the game; here are the ones I remember:

You can buy raffle tickets: first prize--you get to leave!!!
It's a free ADD test--if you can pay attention to the game, you don't have it.
Cleveland's coach hasn't announced his starting quarterback; it may be YOU!
The first 1000 fans get a Cincinnati Bengals hat.
They will be playing other games on the Jumbotron.

Golf Etiquette and Intelligence

If you don't want yourself or your golf cart hit by my ball, then don't park it between me and the hole.

Versus?

Here's one reason why most Americans just aren't into hockey:

I'm getting excited about the playoffs and even thinking that it's good I'll be home this evening and can watch Game 2 between the Wings and the Blackhawks, but no. The game is on Versus. Versus??? You know that major cable network that isn't carried by Charter unless you pay for a sports package.

The NHL needs a different tv contract and soon.

Wings Win, Wings Win!!!

I'm not a hockey fan--after all I grew up in Alabama. My town had the most southern outdoor ice rink in the country but most of the time they had to have some kind of sheeting around it in order to keep the ice frozen. When I lived in IL, I had friends who enjoyed the Rivermen so I would go to games with them. I think upper bowl tickets were $3, and we thought it was awful that they charge $4 or more for playoff games! In OH I went to a bombers game once. The funniest part of that game was a water company's promotion that was on the jumbotron and the announcer would say, "What do you want to drink while watching the Bombers?" The crowd would yell, "BEER!!!" and the announcer would say, "That's right, cold refreshing water."

Since moving to Michigan I've been to 4 hockey games which means basically one game a season.

But now Jayne from handbells is influencing me to get excited about the Red Wings. Although I was working this afternoon, I had the game on and realized the Wings won and that it was over in time for Jayne to get to church on time.

Tuesday night is game 2.

WBB Blues

Talk about depressing--both Oklahoma and Stanford lost in the women's tournament yesterday. No t-shirt for me this year.

If I had a dollar for everyone time I said, "I just don't like UConn" during last night's game, I'd be rich! Just ask Renae.

Kay Yow

Kay Yow died yesterday. She was all that is right is about women's basketball. I got to see her coach in the Dayton regionals in 1998 when her team went to the Final Four.

Monday Miscellaneous

1. I read a blog called Stuff Christians Like occasionally. Usually it's pretty funny, but as a former high school athletic director I really liked this post on Christians and sports. From the comments I learned that God is a Crimson Tide fan. Seriously, look it up; however, apparently King James didn't realize it's Bama and not Bamah.

2. Over the weekend my friend Renae got an e-mail for one of our favorite stores that favorite customers could get 50% off their entire purchase from 3-7 that day only. Of course, we head off to the store. She bought a pair of pants. At the checkout counter as they bagged her pants I said, "Oh, there isn't the Christmas tissue paper this year?" This store always wraps your purchase in tissue paper and last year they had tissue paper with Christmas lights on it. The sales associate said, "I can put some in the bag for you, but we don't have time today to wrap the purchases."

I shook my head as I left and thought, "What wrong here. Renae gets an e-mail as a valued customer for that day only. We make the effort to go to the store, and yet the service that we have come to expect from them, an extra touch that is really nice, is deleted because they are too busy--for their valued customers?" By the way, no one was in line behind us and the s.a. didn't smile either.

3. We had a lot of snow over the weekend. There's at least a foot of snow on the ground and the good news that it's going to start snowing this afternoon through tomorrow night.

I Won, I Won, I Won!!!

After 14 years, I've finally won my women's basketball bracket!!! I was so excited last night. And even though I didn't see the end of the game, my Lady Vols won by 1 point on a put back with .7 seconds left!

I will post a picture of my prize T-shirt after I receive it. For years, I've faithfully paid my $3-5 to buy the t-shirt for the winners, and now it's mine. After all the years I so joyously gave the t-shirt to others and shared in their joy, I'd think all the previous winners would be happy for me. Such is apparently not the case.

At least Mary and Haley are happy for me.