Hello again!
We have had a fun and VERY active month. I have played more competitive pool in the last 6 weeks than in the previous 3 years! Derek is back to work now, and much to my satisfaction, VERY productive and motivated. He's a lot easier to live with than he was in, say...February. The tulips are in full bloom; some daffodils are still fresh and cheery, and all kinds of lovely plants are poking through the surface, anxious to show their bright, colorful faces as the weather warms. All in all, LIFE IS GOOD!
I'll turn back to late March for a minute. In the last newsletter, I don't think I talked about Albuquerque nearly as much as I should've. The trip had quite an impact on me. Not only did I get to meet an amazingly youthful great-aunt and cousins that I've never known, I overcame my fear of flying!....ahem, with the help of Xanax, of course. Having spent the last few weeks compiling a Scrapbook by which to remember the trip, I realized that there are bunches of Albuquerque experiences that I didn't mention. But rather than go into great detail now, I'll just plan on showing you the scrapbook. Family: I'll have it at Colleen's graduation party in May. Friends: I'll have it at Derek's birthday party in June.
Oh yes...that reminds me...mark your calendars! June 22 is the day! Derek's birthday is actually on the 13th, but we have a few scheduling conflicts. This year's party theme will be "Jamaica Mon" (Caribbean). Wear your island duds, hope for sun, and plan on drinking Red Stripe, Corona, Dos Equis, and fruity drinks with umbrellas. My pal Gregory from work, a U-Club chef from Trinidad, suggested "meat on sticks" and lots of tropical fruit for snacking. And back by popular demand will be another CRAFT project!!! Wanting to keep in line with the Jamaican theme, Derek suggested "Make your own bong." Try explaining THAT one to the neighbors! Haha! But instead we'll make Island friendship bracelets. I will be sending e-mail and paper invitations within the next couple weeks.
Movies we rented this month (Hollywood Video membership--$10 for buy-one-get-one-free for a month made all these rentals affordable!)
Zoolander K-Pax Sexy Beast
Robocop Bandits The Whole Nine Yards
American Psycho Riding in Cars With Boys
Waking Ned Devine Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back
The Sixth Day Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner
What’s The Worst That Could Happen?
We enjoyed all of them except The Sixth Day, which had potential but fell short, and Guess Who's Coming To Dinner, which we didn't have time to watch. Will be sure to rent that again, inspired by Sidney Poitier's Honorary Achievement Award at the Oscars. Aside from The Sixth Day, Riding in Cars With Boys was probably my least favorite of the bunch. It was decent, but the others were all great (we had seen many of them before; Bandits was our favorite movie of the year). For more info about any one of these flicks, check out our favorite movie website, imdb.com. But I'm warning you: it's a fun site. You might forget to come back to THIS page if you go there!
Highlights of the month for me at work...rather, "lowlights,"...were a painstaking interview series for SORC's Student Manager for the 2002-2003 school year and yet another uncomfortable situation with my pool table mechanic. Both revolved around individuals who weren't pulling their weight, and each situation requires confrontation. I am not bad at it anymore, but it's still not something I look forward to...particularly having to tell someone you're not happy with their performance. But despite those two bad situations, it was a pleasant and productive month at the Union.
For the last week or so in March, Derek worked every day and collapsed into bed each evening. After not working regularly for so many months, jumping headfirst into roofing every day can really take its toll on a body...especially a forty-hmmphmmp-year-old body. But with a sluggish economy and many roofers he knows begging for work, he is happy to be bringing home the bacon again.
We've had the joy of seeing lots of wildlife out the back
window this month. I saw a pheasant in the farmer's field, and one night
when Derek and I returned from our Monday
league, there were 5 deer just a few feet from the house (nibbling my new plant growth, I suspect...grrrr).
They scattered when they saw our headlights. We see deer pretty often, but
seeing them this close was a first. Our perennial backyard mallards
floated and nibbled in the standing water that also returns every spring.
Ratso spends hours cooing at the sparrows that make their nest in our roof
soffit, and he is basically obsessed with birds and anything that he can
capture. But I let him out the back door to see the mallards, and he sort
of freaked out when he got close enough to see how big they are. It was
funny to watch his internal struggle. You could almost see his thoughts in
a little bubble over his head..."Wow! Birds! <cooorewrewrew>
I've got to chase them. Holy shit, are they big. Are those really
BIRDS? Better crouch down here in the grass and wait it out."
The mallards saw him but didn't seem the least bit frightened.
March 30 was a busy Saturday. I donated blood, spent
an hour in the garden (clipping dead stuff); and moved laundry
all darn day. Derek worked that day as
well. The next morning, Derek was up before me and surprised me with a
full breakfast (believe it or not he's pretty darn good at the cooking
part! The cleaning-up part, well, we still need to work on that, but hey,
one shouldn't complain about a free breakfast!) and fresh coffee. We busied ourselves
with more laundry and a much-needed spring clean-up (still in progress), and
stopped at Home Depot for more paint samples and white paint for our new dresser
for the guest bedroom. We bought it at Naked Furniture so it was
bare wood. We decided to paint it white with yellow drawers the same color
as the newly-painted walls in the room. The drawer knobs will be sage
green to match the bedspread (we'll see if that looks right and may reevaluate
the knob color later). That night I managed to get the first coat of
primer on, before heading to Kristin's house for Easter dinner with her and
the Stockings...Kathy, Ric Lawson, Foster, Fred, and Mary Alice. Little
Foster charmed the pants off of all of us. It was a lovely evening.
In early April I got a visit from my ACUI colleague, Jeff Davis, from UC Colorado Springs. He was in town for the Adult National Figure Skating Championships (he plays the P.A. music at all kinds of figure skating competitions--cool huh?), so he asked if I could get together with him. Despite rainy weather, we had a nice lunch together and a tour of campus before I dropped him off at the "Ann Arbor Ice Cube" so he could get to work.
At the Hall of Fame 9-Ball tournament that week, I joyfully practiced with my old friend Alice, who is currently ranked number 20 on the Women's Professional Billiards Association Tour. It was very encouraging to hold my own against her. I think we each won about the same number of games. Back in our undergrad days, Alice and I worked together at the Billiards Room!
On April 5 I left for Indiana University to cheer on my student, James Tuttle, in the National 9-Ball Intercollegiate tournament. I ran into a bunch of snags at work and ended up leaving several hours after I intended to. By the time I arrived in Bloomington, James was already out of the tournament. He was pretty bummed about his performance. He had been gearing up for it for 6 weeks, since the regional championship in February. But as I told him, losing doesn't mean you're the worst player there (he clearly was not); it just means you didn't put in the best performance on that particular day.
At the request of the Tournament Director, I immediately started to referee matches, and didn't finish until after 9:00 that night. I was very disappointed with the management of the tournament. A National Championship deserves to have a qualified, knowledgeable tournament director and capable referees, and although this guy was very, very nice, and his volunteers were very, very helpful, their qualifications are very much in question. His expertise at Pocket Billiards is cursory at best, and the referees knew NOTHING about competitive pool. When I told competitors that I was their scorekeeper and was qualified to make judgment calls on their matches, they were thrilled as well as shocked. It is a program that I could dramatically improve, but with the new leadership of the International Recreation Committee, I don't want a position of such high visibility yet. If things go wrong--and I'm sure they will--it will be far too easy to get blamed for it.
On a lighter note, Derek and Aaron happened to be playing in a tournament in Fort Wayne the following day, so after refereeing a few more ACUI matches in the morning, I stopped in Fort Wayne on my way home and spent most of the day there. I got to see a bunch of old tournament friends, most importantly Tammie (Wesley) Jones, another former WPBA player and sparring partner of mine. I haven't seen her in a couple years, and although she was busy making T-shirts for the event participants, we had an hour or so to talk about her little girl, and how much we're both NOT playing, and catch up on old times. It was great fun.
April 7 and April 13 were both BIG Creative Memories days for me. I had my pals over and spent 3-5 hours each day on scrapbooking. My colleague and friend, Barb, is now a CM consultant. Heck, she doesn't even have to "sell" the products to us! As soon as we found out, 2 of the 3 other people at the table placed an order. Elaine even suggested that she might have a lead on a party for Barb. We are the easiest customers in the world!
Derek finished in 3rd place at the Hall of Fame tournament
on April 11--his first good finish since January. I was exhausted by then,
but we stayed
very late to collect money from a guy who owes him a debt (he was playing in the
finals; hence, guaranteed money in his pocket).
OK, here's the requisite "Betz, you are such a weirdo" paragraph: WORM RESCUE. We got a lot of rain in April. One Saturday morning, as Derek left for work, I noticed that there were dozens of worms "stranded" on the rapidly-drying concrete in our driveway. Having seen many dried worm carcasses, I assume that this is how they die. So for about 20 minutes, in my bare feet, I tiptoed around the yard, picking up wriggly worms and throwing them into the flowerbed, urging to them "go forth and fertilize my soil." This was also the day that I vowed, inspired by an article in Woman's Day, to hug Derek for 30 seconds every morning. When I told him about it, he gave me that "what have you been smoking?" look, but eventually compromised on 15 seconds. We were pretty good for the first few days but have since forgotten all about it. Until now! (Note to self: make hug reminder sign for kitchen counter).
I attended my friend and colleague, Donna’s wedding on April 13 in Fraser, MI. I sat at a table with 4 other co-workers and their spouses. Donna has really scored herself one heck of a good guy, near as I can figure. The meal was yummy, and the bride and groom's families seemed like really cool, fun-loving people. I even had a glass of wine!!! Yes, me! The one who gets hot flashes and nausea from a half-dose of Nyquil!!!
It turned hot as Hell around April 15 (Tax day--you think that was an accident?), and stayed in the high 80s for 4 or 5 days. Derek and I had Pool league that night, and fortunately, the bar had air conditioning. I beat my buddy Eddie, and he was very gracious in his defeat. The next week, the League Operator bumped my skill rating up from a 5 to a 6. D'oh! (This means I have to win more games against my opponents now).
Here's another sappy tidbit (sort of an addendum to the "Weirdo" paragraph): Every Monday night, Derek and I have "Family time" with the critters. Let me first say that this, like most of our silly cat rituals (have you seen the Thanksgiving dinner photo?), was DEREK's idea. So if you feel the need to do any accusin', direct it to the D-man. Anyway...since the weather has turned nice, we invite them outside with us as we carry trash and recycling bins to the curb in tandem. They LOVE to walk to the end of the driveway with us and play hide-and-seek between the bushes. Cats are so smart. Now, when we come home from Pool League (Monday night, the same night as recycling), they are all waiting by the door for "Family Time." It is so cute you'd just want to puke.
In preparation for the April BCA State Championship Tournament, I "kicked it up a notch," vowing to practice at least three times a week. The practicing paid off. In our Monday league (with Derek's roofing crew), I am undefeated since November. In my Wednesday league (the one on which I'm one of the weaker players), I posted a record of 14-4. Our team finished in 2nd place in the Master's Division at the BCA tournament at Soaring Eagle Casino, losing the first-place title by only ONE game (we played 90 games). My performance in the team event was not all that great, but I was the only woman in the Master's division of the tournament. My proudest moment was a table run against Benny Alvarado, aka "Benny the Head" (don't you just love pool nicknames?), a top-notch Michigan 8-ball bar player. He showed a lot of class--congratulated me on my win, said he had fun watching me "whoop up" on him, and even gave me a hug later that day.
I only managed a 7th place finish in the Women's Singles (saddening because I am certain that I play as well as any other woman there, but just didn't give my best performance in that particular arena). However, my partner and old friend, Aaron Toth and I, won the Scotch Doubles title! In Scotch Doubles, you alternate shots--not innings--so that if I pocket a ball, my partner has to pocket the next ball, and so on until we either win the game or miss. You can't speak to each other during your turn, so a team really has to be in synch and read each other's next move in order to win. We got off to a slow start, but later in the evening began to function like a well-oiled machine. We won the tournament UNDEFEATED!!! Derek stayed for all but the last match. Aaron's wife, Stacy, and both of their parents were there until the wee hours of the morning, cheering us on. What a wonderful bunch of people!!!
We both believe that we won because we are not a spousal couple. Haha! There were 40 other teams; among the teams who were married to or dating each other, there was a LOT of shouting and even some storming out of the room. I suspect it would be equally stressful if Derek and I were to team up. Aaron and I both adopted the perspective of having fun, not setting any unrealistic expectations of each other, and not getting mad when we made mistakes. Aaron said it's possibly the most fun he's had in any tournament (this coming from a guy who plays pool 4-5 nights a week!!!) He is a dear friend, and it is largely because of his encouragement and support that I am seeing some success in pool again. So Aaron...I have said this to you personally, but let me say it publicly: Thank you!!!!! (And, in a very noteworthy side piece, Aaron won the Open Singles Championship that weekend, out of over 100 of the best Bar-table 8-ball players in the state! Then, he and Stacy got lucky on the slot machines in the casino. They went home with a few trophies and a hefty wad of cash in his pocket...rather, in Stacy's purse where it belongs! J Congrats, pal!)
With the prize money burning a small hole in my pocket, I stopped at the Brighton outlets on the way home from the casino. I scored 3 tulip-shaped candle holders for the guest bedroom and a planter on clearance at Mikasa, a couple pairs of work slacks at Dress Barn, and 3 sheets of scrapbooking stickers at the Paper Outlet. Not a crazy splurge--just enough to whet my whistle. Derek stayed at the casino for another hour or so with our friend, JB, and pocketed about $150 from the slots.
Almost as soon as I got home, my SORC staffers came over for pizza and "SORC Lifer" award presentation. We award a laser-inscribed U of M paperweight to anyone who works all 4 years of school at the SORC (referred to as "lifers"). There was only one inductee to the club this year, but we made the most of it. I was anxious to show off my trophy and challenged my best student player to a game of 9-ball on our big table, but after playing on bar tables all weekend, I couldn’t make a ball! The table seemed to be about 20 feet long, and the pockets about an inch wide! After pizza, the award presentation, and a raucous game of Euchre, Derek entertained the troops with trick shots and a few card tricks before they scurried back to campus to study for finals.
April 24 marked the 11-year anniversary of our first date...can you BELIEVE it!? Last year we went out to a fancy restaurant, but this year we just stayed low-key, grilling some marinated steaks and baking some sweet taters on the evening of the 23rd.
Wednesday the 24th was the semi-finals
of my Wednesday night league, when we had to face the 2nd-place team (we were in
1st) to see who would get the home field advantage for the Finals. I won all
3 of my games off some of the best shooters in the league! Our team also eked out
a victory for the evening, by just a few points. It was pretty
exciting. I definitely think I had an advantage by being female that
night. Those boys (all under 25, I'd estimate) have never seen a woman who
can shoot decently, and I'm sure it cracked them. I LOVE those kinds of
matches! Sure makes my job easy!
Last Friday we grilled hot dogs and
burgers on the "barbie." Derek brought home a co-worker from
Honduras who speaks very little English (Holly, we could have used your
translation skills!), and we treated him to a few Coronas and a couple games of
pool. Katie's roommate, Kathryn, was there, and she speaks a little
Spanish, so she did her best to communicate for all of us.
This was not a competitive tournament like most of the ones I play in (lose just one game and you're out!), but the focus was not winning. For some people the focus was drinking and hitting on your partner (ha!) but for all of us, it was raising money for CF, and in that regard it was tremendously successful! Each person's $40 entry fee went to CFF, and I also solicited pledges from my wonderful co-workers, to the tune of $120 more for the fund. Aren't they awesome???!!! There were over 100 players, and partners were randomly chosen. My partner, Kevin, and I finished in 3rd place. The match we lost was the semi-finals against last year's winner, and we played well. She left me a relatively difficult 8-ball bank shot, and I missed it by about a half-centimeter. I left it in the jaws of the pocket, and then her partner handily pocketed their one remaining ball and the 8 for the win. Considering that first prize was a "sack of booze," as someone described it (I am allergic to alcohol of any kind), I really didn't lose much by getting 3rd place instead of 1st...except, of course, the bragging rights. Lori also had a great time, playing much better than she expected for her very first tournament!
I crashed in Lori's guest bedroom that night, and Lori's mom, my Aunt Barb, treated us to breakfast in the morning. I ordered crepes and a side of ham, which I would later regret. The ham tasted sour, but I didn't say anything about it. Like a carnivorous fool, I ate the WHOLE serving even though it tasted less than perfect. In the parking lot, Aunt Barb gave me 3 Winnie-the-Pooh clothing items for no reason in particular, except that she is incredibly kind and generous (I love them all, Aunt Barb!!!). After breakfast I started the journey home. Around the Indiana/Michigan border, the food poisoning set in. Let's just say I made really good time on the trip, and hardly moved from the couch once I got home, curled up in the fetal position.
While I was en route, Derek's mom and step-dad, just back for the summer from Florida, stopped in for a visit. The three of them went to downtown Ypsi to look at a new rental property that Derek is considering buying. His mom gave him the two thumbs up, so he is going to investigate further in upcoming weeks. Derek picked up some DVDs and he joined me in my woes on the couch for the rest of the night.
Monday night at the APA league was my first night rated as a 6 instead of a 5. I played Holley, who is a 2. That meant I had to win SIX games before she won just TWO! It was a challenge, but I managed to pull it off. I am really not looking forward to being a 6 all the time though. Too much pressure! That evening I dropped my boss, Alana, at airport for a trip to Ireland. She asked if she could leave her car at our house while she's gone, to which we were more than happy to comply. In return, I get to drive her new, red Volkswagen Beetle around for a week!
We mowed the lawn in 40-degree weather that night, not by choice. In some places the grass was 10 inches tall! But the standing water had finally dried, so it was our first chance to mow without needing an amphibious vehicle. It made me think of that e-mail that goes around called "You Know You're From Michigan If...." My addition: "....you've ever worn mittens and a parka to mow your lawn."
On Tuesday we had a long-awaited Don Carlos visit with some of my favorite chicas from work. It started as a girls-night-out thing, but Derek decided to join us too (this is very unlike him). Salve joined us again but didn't hit on anyone this time. I think it's because no one else spoke a word of Spanish. I was pleased to see that he really liked the food, though. We have always known that Don Carlos' food is awesome (it is ranked in the Top 50 Hispanic restaurants in the US by Hispanic Magazine), but somehow it means more to hear that the food is good, coming from someone familiar with real Central American cuisine. I would highly recommend checking out the Don Carlos website above. I just browsed it myself, and it's very cool!
Wednesday night was the finals of Aaron's & my 8-ball league. We got off to a horrible start. Everyone on the team played as if their cue weighed 500 pounds. We missed balls that we would normally pocket 100 out of 100 times. We were beginning to think that "those young punks" had pulled some kind of voodoo on us. Yikes! I almost went from being the only player on our team to win all three games last week, to the only player to lose all three this week. But in the end we pulled it together and squeaked out a victory for the League Championship! Unfortunately I will have to miss the Awards Banquet because I will be in the U.P. for my cousin Colleen's graduation and a family reunion of sorts (a sort of unplanned one). Not a chance I'm going to miss that!
While I was at league that night, Derek washed all his vehicles and spent about 4 hours cleaning up the big garage. It had gotten pretty darn messy during the long winter. I predict that the golf net will be reappearing in the back yard very soon.
Well, the dresser is now in stage 4...has two coats of primer and two coats of paint, now awaiting the latex urethane finish, which I hope to do this weekend. I also have a VERY long list of other home projects to tackle, this being the first weekend I'm at home and don't have to work since mid-March! Derek is working on Saturday, so I will resume my summer routine of bringing lunch to the job site if the weather is nice (is he spoiled or what?).
Have a wonderful weekend...or week, depending on when you get this...and I hope to see you in "Jamaica Mon!" on June 22 if not sooner!!!
Love,