April 09, 2003
April 08, 2003
Softball Disaster
Today Abby had her third game. It was at 5:00, which meant that I had to leave work at 4:00. I stopped at Taco del Mar, got the girls their burritos for dinner, then tried to call the afterschool program so they could tell Abby to get into her uniform. Discovered that my cell phone was dead. Great.
So I got to school, was happily surprised to find Abby already dressed, all the way to her hat. Yay Abby! Her friend's mom had been there a few minutes before me, and they'd both dashed off to change when she got there.
We are supposed to arrive 30 minutes ahead of game time so that there's time to warm up. We were not 30 minutes early, so I dropped Abby off at the edge of the park, since I saw a red team in the field right there, and went to find a parking space.
Turns out, the red team in the field was NOT Abby's team, and we walked all the way through the park and found her team. It was in a field way out back. So Katrina and I find a place to sit, then Abby comes over and tells us that we're not playing here, but at the elementary school down the road.
A pow-wow with the coach reveals that two games were scheduled for the same field, at the same time. We are the losers, and have to find somewhere different. This won't be a regular league game, as there's no umpire, base lines, etc.
The girls' dad is coming to the game, but is not there yet, and my cell is dead, and I can't call him to tell him where we're going. We arrive at the new place, the girls warm up for what feels like forever. Things get going around 5:30, I think. I end up borrowing someone's phone to call their father, and he gets there eventually.
I look on the bright side and think, hey, I should be able to get some good pictures today since there's no chain link fence between me and Abby playing. I take about six pictures, and the batteries on the camera die. Apparently I did not appease the battery gods properly, as I am having no luck with any kind of battery today.
There's no place to sit here, and it's all very sandy and dirty. Ugh. And while it was a nice, warm spring day while the sun was out, the sun is going down, and it's getting windy and cold! Katrina does her homework, and it's 6:30, and it seems like the game is never going to end. Shortly after, I run her back down to the park so she can use the bathroom -- there's none at the school.
Abby plays second base a couple of times, and outfield a couple of times. The other team is really quite good, and they get a bunch of hits. At least once, maybe twice, they got all four runs that they're allowed to have in an inning. She only gets up to bat once, and strikes out. It starts to rain, not hard, but I can feel it. It gets colder.
Katrina amuses herself by playing in the sand. She digs out little ditches, throws it up in the air and hits it away from herself. She's filthy. Finally, the game is over, and we can go home. We are very glad to get in the warm car! We get home, and Katrina starts to get out, and says, "Where's my backpack?" I have a crystal clear image of it sitting in the grass by the top of the steps. We drive back. It's not there. We go back home. At this point, it's 8:00. Hopefully Thursday's game goes much better than today's did!