Well, I continue to be on the 3-month plan with newsletters!  Unless you’re new to my e-mail list, the last time you heard from us was shortly before Christmas.  A lot has been happening in our lives since then--fortunately, almost all good stuff.

Here are the highlights.  You can decide for yourself whether to continue reading for the details:

Christmas Eve with my family in the U.P. was, as always, a lovely evening….except there was no snow!  First time in about two decades!  Despite the shortage of white stuff, there was lots of food, lots of laughs, lots of hugs, and--now that I have the website bug, of course--lots of pictures!  Look for links throughout this e-mail, to look at pictures of our happ’nings.  Lynn and Joe hosted the show this year.  There were 18 family members, and with boyfriends, neighbors, and random droppers-in, we were well over the mark of twenty.  We were a little worried all night, because Uncle Marty, Mom’s youngest brother, was en route from California.  His plane was supposed to have landed in Chicago that morning, and he planned to then drive the rest of the way from Aunt Barb’s in the burbs.  As of 6PM, Aunt Barb hadn’t heard from him.  We found out only the next day, that he’d missed his flight in Las Vegas (if I remember correctly) and decided to drive all the way home.  He eventually made it, but not in time for us to have a visit with him.

We shared Christmas morning at Mom’s.  It sure is nice having Sean and Celina right next door.  Sean, for the first time in a couple years, didn’t have to work on Christmas day, and was able to join us to open gifts.  Derek and I were very excited to see lots of CDs and DVDs under the tree.  Easy to transport back downstate, and Mom and Celina used our amazon.com wish list to ensure we’d get something we liked!  Turkey dinner mmmmmm….must open button on pants…..getting sleepy……nap time….wake me up when it’s time for pie.

On our last day in da U.P., we invited Sean and Celina to dinner at a Marquette must-see:  Casa Calabria.  I had eaten there in July with my college buds, and for Christmas they’d specifically requested the “heavy bread” that we’d enjoyed so much with our summer road trip dinner.   After dinner, our bellies stuffed with pasta and the trunk stuffed with heavy bread, we headed to the movies with Sean and Celina, to take in Gangs of New York.…by all accounts, an extremely well-made, albeit violent and depressing, Oscar-worthy film.  Having not seen either of the other three nominated films yet, I truly hope that it upsets Chicago for the best picture award.  Chicago was very entertaining, but in my opinion, not the right film to pick for Hollywood’s biggest award of the year.  And if Daniel Day Lewis doesn’t win for his performance (ooohhhhh, that man does evil so well!), there is no justice.  Of course, I say this having seen none of the other nominated Best Actor performances.  I sure have some homework to do before my big Oscars party next weekend!  Strange point: a thing that I find ironic about Gangs….of the lead characters, all the American actors speak in a learned Irish brogue, while Lewis, the only British actor in the film, uses a 19th-Century New York / Brooklyn accent. 

A few days after returning home from the U.P., I met with Ciara and Ange to exchange gifts and do some scrapbooking.  At long last I finally met Ciara’s sister Niamh, who was every bit as charming and witty as I’d imagined her to be.  It's the Comerford genes!  We had a little post-holiday feast at TGI Fridays.  Just a couple days later, we gathered--minus Niamh, plus our old college friend Rachel--at Romano’s Macaroni Grill for a great meal (my favorite--chicken marsala) and, for some unknown reason, lots of cat stories.  Imagine that!

I worked on New Year’s Eve, but still finished in time for a spectacular dinner at Kristin’s house.  About 10 guests pitched in for filet mignon, lobster tails, and crab legs.  She and Kathy really did a great job cooking it all to sumptuous perfection.  Thinking about it still makes my mouth water!  We rang in the New Year with Kristin, Erik, Kathy, Ric, Jeannine, and Jim after a heated game of Charades:  Boys vs. Girls.  I don’t think we kept score, but I’m pretty sure the girls lost.  But not for lack of trying!  It sure was a great time.  The two subjects that I had to deliver (pulled from a hat), were “Karma Chameleon” and “Spartacus.”  We usually stick to movies, songs, etc., so it narrows down the topics tremendously.  Even still, we weren’t able to get those two!  Spartacus was really hard, but I can’t believe we didn’t get Karma Chameleon.  My team knew that it was a song, that it was two words, and the first word was Karma.  They also managed to get two syllables of the second word: __me__on.  But we ran out of time.  If I’d had another child of the 80s on my team, we surely would have locked that one up with just the word "Karma"!

We enjoyed one last day (January 1) together before Derek’s 10-day trip to Louisville for the Derby City Classic.  Derek watched…what else….football, while Betz cropped lots of Christmas pictures for the scrapbook album.  Hey, at least we were in the same room.

After what I call “Hell Week” (the first week of classes), my car was towed for the first time in my entire Ann Arbor history.  Parking being what it is--rather, what it isn’t--this is not an uncommon occurrence for longtime residents of our fair city.  $160, a late-night cab ride, and several numb toes later (it was 8 degrees that night), the ol’ Saturn was back in my loving care.  Turns out the owner of the vacant building didn’t appreciate the aforementioned gray Saturn taking up a space in his lot (even though he didn’t notice it there for the SIX MONTHS I parked there previously, often the only car in the lot). So now I'm back to parking on the street near the bus stop, even though people are now starting to get wise to this trick, and spaces are harder to come by.

Derek performed well in Louisville and, more importantly, had a great time rubbing elbows with the pros again.  He finished in 13th place in a field of 292 One-Pocket players.  His success in the 9-ball event was impeded by the required late-night matches as he reached the final rounds in One-Pocket (one tournament piggy-backs the other, starting before the last one is finished).  I hardly missed him while he was gone.....too busy working (usually about 10-12 hours a day, weekends included) and dealing with the angry cats when I got home late at night. 

The family was back together, and work eased up a little, on January 15.  We treated ourselves to new bedding & curtains!  That night we were in the office, Derek reading and I on the computer (which are our normal positions), when our smallest and most timid cat, Simonie, surprised Ratso, our biggest and most aggressive cat.  She pounced on him from under the desk as he walked by, knocking him (by sheer momentum, as he outweighs her two to one) into the wall and off his feet.  The only ones more out of breath than Ratso, were Derek and I, because we were laughing so damn hard!  Derek made me laugh even harder when he referred to it as “Simonie cross-checked Ratso into the boards,” …..“the boards” being the oak trim base boards.  It was as beautiful as little Steve Yzerman stickin’ it to someone like Claude LeMieux (Le Booooo!)

Derek wasn’t home for long; he left again for Fort Wayne for another tournament on January 18.  Fortunately, he was only gone a day and a half this time. 

Many of you may remember receiving an e-mail from me on January 20, announcing that we’d been hacked!  It was an awful experience!  Fortunately, our computer is safe.  It appears that someone simply used our e-mail address (which is fairly simple to do, without actually having access to one’s e-mail account) when sending an invitation to his porn site.  I’ve since apologized to about 100 other AOL users, most of whom had a few choice words for me.  I considered, only for a second, closing the account and getting a new provider.

The host contract with BCA (Billiards Congress of America) was at last signed in late January.  After battling for almost two months over the details of the contract, which U of M’s Legal Eagles dictated very precisely, followed by a medical emergency that took the only person who could sign it out of commission (and in the hospital, yikes) for three weeks, I was convinced that the BCA was going to back out and choose another host site for their Junior National Championships.  I was forced to use my charm and diplomacy to the absolute breaking point.  Forced politeness is as about as high on my “favorite things to do” list as a visit to the gynecologist, so yeah, that was a sucky month in that regard.

A funny little surprise on the evening of January 24….Derek was off playing pool and I was again alone, in a big house, late at night, when a car pulled slowly into the driveway.  No knock on the door, but the car remained in the driveway, for several minutes.  Having turned off all the lights in the house (it was, after all, after 2AM, and who could possibly be coming for a visit?), I looked out the window, and the car was gone.  So I got back on the computer, thinking it must have been someone turning around.  Ten minutes later, I saw the lights again, only this time the car was pulling into the driveway backwards.  This went on for almost a half-hour, the car pulling in and out of the driveway a half-dozen times.  But I couldn’t see anything.  It was a pitch-black country evening.  Finally, cell phone and 10” chef’s knife clutched firmly in hand, I opened the shade and turned on the porch light.  It was then that I saw the lights on top of the car, and the sheriff’s seal on the passenger door.  In that same instant, a speeder went by, and the cruiser was off to bust him. 

Everyone tells me that the police are not supposed to do this (patrol from private property), but they have my full support!  Anything to slow down the speed maniacs who abuse our road!  The posted speed limit is 45, but to see any passer-through going less than 60 is rare.  And we have seen kids drag racing on this strip many, many times.  The only thing that slows them down (albeit only a little) is the gravel that they hit about 50 yards past our driveway.  Rumor has had it for a couple years that the one-mile gravel portion of Munger Road between our house and Michigan Avenue would be paved, effectively clearing a path for hundreds of Southern Ypsi Township residents to the freeway.  Last summer, it became more than a rumor.  Trees were cleared, lines were spray-painted, and orange trucks have been ever-present.  I am afraid that our time has come.  I am in absolute dread over this situation, because our cats have gotten way too comfortable prancing across the road to explore the rodent-filled field on the other side.  And I don’t know that there’s anything we can do to train them away from the road.  Shiver.

On Super Bowl Sunday, we awoke to a flock of wild turkeys in the field behind our house.  We’ve grown quite accustomed to seeing them at Mom’s house, but I didn’t even know that there are turkeys in this part of the state!  We saw them again several times in the next month or so. 

We watched the Super Bowl at Kathy and Ric’s house.  The evening itself was pretty uneventful (aside from adoring Kathy & Ric’s new kitchen!  Gorgeous!), but we were treated to a memorable half-time show that far outshone Shania Twain [ (cough) white trash!], Gwen Stefani, and Sting.  Kathy & Ric’s son Foster, getting ready for bed, took it upon himself to run through the living room and kitchen, then back to his bedroom, STARK NAKED!!!!  I didn’t manage to get a picture of his cute little naked baby butt, but click here to see a picture of his adorable little ponem a few days after Christmas, when they came to our house for dinner and movies. 

Weeks and weeks of working too much, and not getting enough sleep or proper meals and fluids, finally caught up with me in the end of January.  A head and chest cold KICKED MY BUTT.  This happens every year around this time.  January and February are extremely busy months, more so even than the start of the school year in many respects. In addition to the 10+ hour days, campus weekend recreation tournaments require that I work seven days a week, literally for six weeks straight.  Plain and simple:  I burn out.  My brain doesn’t give out, but my immune system can only protect me for so long.  I missed only a couple half-days at work (couldn’t spare the time!), and the darn cold stuck with me for almost three weeks, before I finally kicked the cough. 

February 14-16 was the weekend of the ACUI Intercollegiate Recreation Tournaments at the University of Toledo.  I wrote in detail about the Rec tournaments in a past newsletter, so I won't go into the details again, but it's by far my biggest program of the year.  Things went extremely well, thanks in large part to the efforts of my best bud, Angela.  She volunteered her Valentine's Day evening to drive to Toledo and help me with registration!  Now that's the sign of a true friend.  Region 7 and I treated her (treated both of us) to a Chinese Buffet later that night.  She works cheap!  

Before I even got home from the tournament on Sunday the 16th, Derek and our friend Steve departed for Atlantic City, for a HUGE pool tournament at The Trump Marina & Casino.  The thought of bad weather didn't even cross their minds, so they didn't check the weather channel before leaving.  They headed straight into that huge snowstorm...surely you remember hearing about it on the news....the one that covered the entire Atlantic coast in as much as 4 feet of snow?  Yeah, they drove through that.  Unfortunately, they were over halfway through Pennsylvania before they realized that the weather wasn't getting any better.  They called me, and I told them about what had been on the news all day that day:  the biggest storm to hit Philadelphia / Washington DC / New York City, in almost a century.  It took them 8 hours to drive 80 miles, and they got stuck several times.  There were very few exits where they could even get off for gas, and most hotels were all booked up.  Finally, after 20 hours of extremely stressful travel, they arrived at the Trump Hotel, and guess what!  They couldn't get a room!  Because New Jersey was in a state of emergency, none of the hotel employees could go home.  So every room was taken.  In retrospect, they wish they'd turned around and come back to Michigan immediately after talking to me that night, but hind sight is 20/20.  They kept hoping it would get better.  They also knew that, at the end of the line was one of the biggest tournaments of the year.  They didn't want to risk missing it.  As it turned out, the event was postponed by 24 hours anyway, but they didn't imagine that as they were traveling.  Their sole focus was getting to Atlantic City.

Derek described it simply as "The Trip From Hell."  They were very disappointed in the tournament as a whole, the casino, the hotel, the food, and all the amenities.  Nonetheless, Derek did have some brushes with greatness and moments of glee.  He defeated the best pool player in the world, Efren Reyes, for 40 bucks!  Well...he doesn't  mention the fact that it was playing Chess rather than Pool, giggle.  But as always, he enjoyed rubbing elbows and hanging out with the pros for a few days.  He lives for events like this.  In the immortal words of Ace Ventura, Pet Detective, "This is my Graceland, sir."  After a week, they were both extremely anxious to head home.  Little did they know, that as they approached Ohio on the way home, they headed straight into another whopper of a snowstorm.  This time, the 40 MPH gusts were a big factor. They not only made the temperature plummet, but caused major drifting.  Steve and Derek endured another 16+ hour trip.  At last, they and the Acura limped into Toledo, having gotten stuck on a freeway overpass in a 4-foot drift of snow at 2AM, only to be pulled out an hour later by their "angel" with a Dodge 4WD pickup, a tow rope, and a kind heart.  Even though, at that point, Derek was only 40 miles from home, from his mamasita, and from his 3 little furry critters, he gave up and spent the night at Steve's house.  He finally made it in the next day around 10:30, and after some hugs and horror stories, he felt into a deep, relaxing sleep.  I didn't wake him up the whole day.  The critters slept beside him and wouldn't leave the room.

Derek didn't leave the house for three days.

We had a very nice visit in early March from Derek's old friend, Ernie, from San Francisco.  Ernie is the person...well, one of a few people...who Derek attributes with getting him really into competitive pool.  Ernie has been to Ann Arbor a couple times since Derek and I started dating, but on the two previous occasions I didn't really have much time to get to know him.  This time, however, he stayed with us a couple days, and we went to a couple tournaments together, and I had lots of time to talk to him and learn more about him and his family.  I've determined that Derek needs to ditch a few of his other friends, and get more friends like Ernie.  I'm trying to convince Derek to meet up with Ernie and his wife, and a bunch of their other friends, at a League Pool Tournament in Las Vegas in May.  Here's where we run into that "fear of flying" thing again.  May might be too soon to talk him into it, but maybe a trip to San Francisco wine country in August, could be arranged (crossing fingers).

I boarded the Amtrak on March 2, bound for Chicago and the ACUI National Conference (this is the same conference that took me to Albuquerque last year, Toronto the year before that, and New York City in Y2K). The conference was very educational, productive, and inspirational...just like it's supposed to be! But there's another key element of ACUI conferences that isn't always associated with work-related trips: fun! The planning team schedules big blocks of free time throughout the conference, to allow the attendees to go out and explore the city. ACUI calls it "experiential learning"....I call it "being a tourist on U of M's dime." Here are the highlights of the trip, and the accompanying photos:

Go look at ACUI trip photos

Sadly, for these major highlights, I ran out of film, and/or forgot to take a picture:

My efforts to convince Derek to stop playing One-pocket, and get back to the game that rewarded him so well for so many years (9-ball), have paid off this year. It has been at least three years since he has had this many tournament and after-hours action victories. I am convinced that it's because he's playing 9-ball instead of One-pocket. All of the One-pocket hustlers in Detroit (and believe me, there are plenty!) are taking the opposing viewpoint; clearly, they stand much to gain by getting him back into the racket. But go figure...he finally agreed with me. He finished in 3rd place in an extremely tough weekend tournament in Jackson on 3/8-3/9. There were over 100 of the best bar-table pool players in Michigan. Unfortunately, I was not able to make it there for the first day of competition because I ran a tournament of my own, for the students at U of M. I did, however, drive out there on Sunday to cheer him on in the final stretch. I think I was a jinx though, because he'd been winning match after match after match, but when I got there, he lost.

Derek started back to work last week, happy to have a flood of roof jobs heading his way. So far, neither he, nor the company he does most of his work for, has fallen prey to the sluggish economy of the last couple years. (knock, knock on the oak wall next to me).

Another childhood friend of Derek's, Stanley, moved back to Michigan from Atlanta this month. I expect we'll be spending lots of time with him. He loves pool (just like us), loves cats (just like us), loves movies (just like us), and is very up-to-speed about what's going on in the world (which we hope he will teach us).

Plans for the BCA Junior Nationals tournament are rolling along very nicely. I've had some minor disputes with the BCA over spectator admission (today was a particularly high-intensity day so I'm not really in a mindset to say a lot of nice things about the organization), but for the most part it's very positive. We've scheduled a regional qualifier for the kids at the Michigan Union, and thanks to my article in the regional magazine "Inside English," two other local pool rooms have scheduled qualifiers too. Check out www.bca-pool.com or www.umich.edu/~billiard for more info about this prestigious Under-18 national championship!

I also revived another tournament for the Michigan Union this month. "Open" tournaments used to be very popular in the Billiards Room, but sort of petered out in the 90s. Students wouldn't put up their money against local players in Open tournaments, because the level of play was simply too high. And the advertising effort required for keeping the Open tournaments going, was simply too much in relation to the number of players we had each week. We've since added all sorts of programs, but most of them are for students only. But now, with Inside English magazine, it has become much easier to promote tournaments to the pool community. Everyone seems to be more "in the loop" when it comes to what's going on in pool in the Midwest. (Big kudos to Kelly for starting a little magazine three years ago and making this happen!) So anyway, our weekly Open tournaments begin on April Fools Day, and we let students play for half-price. I'll keep you posted about how they go.

There is a Women's Qualifier on April 5 in Toledo (the winner earns entry to the WPBA event of her choice--the ones you see on ESPN!) in Toledo, so I'm inspired to get back into stroke again. I've done especially well at this particular pool room in the past. I've finshed in 2nd place twice in previous qualifiers there. I'm hoping the third time is a charm. To that end, I've been playing a lot more and just recently started practicing with my friend and fellow pool player, Sandi. We're good sparring partners; we get along really well.

Finally, the story you've all been waiting for: Owl fails to heed fog advisory; flies into patio window.

Sunday evening...Because of the unseasonably warm temperatures, Mother Nature is in a tizzy. There's flooding everywhere, and a thick blanket of fog has descended upon Southeastern Michigan. All of the local weathermen warn of a Fog Advisory until after midnight. Derek is playing pool in the basement with Stanley; I am puttering around the house doing 18 different things before the weekend ends. This is very typical.

Suddenly, there is a noticeable, but not alarming, THUD. This is not unusual, with three cats in the house. They are always knocking things over, tackling each other, and making various "thuds." Nonetheless, I realize that Simonis is very alert for some reason, and I decide to investigate. I turn on the two light switches to illuminate the deck, but find that one of the lights has burnt out. I don't see anyone or anything on the deck. I set out to get a new bulb, a step ladder, and a screwdriver (the tool, not the beverage). As I open the patio door, I see in the moonlight a little, brownish lump just outside the door, which I know wasn't there before. I gently drop the ladder and grab a flashlight. There, sitting on the deck, alive but seemingly injured, is a 5-inch tall baby owl. He must have flown right into the patio door. Was it because of the fog, or because this was his maiden voyage? He is so small, I can't even believe he can fly yet! I don't realize that it is an owl at first--just thought it was a full-grown bird of some other variety, which isn't nearly as exciting. But then I realize, boy, that's one FAT bird...but it's very top-heavy. (Peering closer)....holy crap, an owl. An O-W-L!!!!! Picture a full-sized owl; now shrink that to 1/4 scale. But keep the full-size owl eyes. The cutest (pardon) Goddamn thing I have ever seen in my life. Hands down.

First thought: SHRIEK! Where are the cats? If they're out, he's toast. 1 - 2 - 3....They're all in, ok. He's safe.

My next thought: where is my camera? "Derek!.....(scrambling over to the basements steps, my voice at a higher pitch than I have had since grade school)....you gotta come up here rightawaythere'sababyowlonthedeck! Comenowcomenowcomenow!"

"Well stop freaking out, or you'll scare it off.......(pause)......A baby *what*?" (Derek and Stanley come up the stairs). Where is that damn camera? It's usually sitting right here on the counter! Oh right...it's in my bag from Chicago. But it doesn't have film in it.

Stanley and I frantically page through two different phone books, trying to find a number for Animal Control. "Derek...grab one of those boxes, and put it over the owl so he's protected." Meanwhile, Derek is clearly outnumbered as he tries to contain the owl and keep all three cats away from it. He somehow forgets about the box. We keep searching for a phone number, which is not as easy to find as you might think, and Simonis (remember--she's the hunter) sneaks out the tiny sliver of the patio door that one of us left open. Derek races to shoo her away from the baby owl, and as he chases her 10 feet away, he turns back to see that the owl is gone. Out of the corner of his eye (remember again, it's extremely foggy), he sees a dark object flying off toward the neighbor's house.

And thus, this miraculous creature is gone from our lives, just as quickly and abruptly as he splatted his feathered face into our patio door. Hopefully, his next stop will be Owl Flight School.

So, in atypical Betz fashion, I do NOT have a photo of this latest brush with nature....only the story. I have spent the last three days cursing myself for not grabbing the camera first. Then, it evolved to cursing Derek for not putting the owl in a box like Stanley and I repeatedly said, as we paged through the phone books.

We had a warm spell this week. Yesterday it was almost 60 degrees, and the weather man is calling for 60 again on Thursday. Spring has sprung! Sure, there's flooding. Our lawn is completely saturated, and in the back, there is over a foot of standing water with nowhere to go. The sump pump drainage pipe still has frozen water in it, so the sump itself is useless. Last night, we drained about 1800 gallons of water, via a hose running from the sump pump upstairs to the half-bath sink. Didn't even make a dent in the amount of water in the back yard. But somehow, I am not even worried about that. There is too much good stuff that has been brought on by this warm spell. Spring cleaning, a rejuvenated and motivated boyfriend, and a few lone tulips and hyacinths breaking through the earth. Before long, Coleman's Produce Market will be open with bountiful, beautiful annuals to add to the mix. Every year, I realize more and more why people love gardening so much.

Have a wonderful Spring!!!

Love,

Betsy (as always, with an occasional nod from Derek)

If you would like me to stop harassing you with invitations to read this newsletter and browse my website, e-mail me here: Betsy stop harassing me., Otherwise, stay tuned for the next installment! And don't forget...our next party isn't far off. It'll be either June 7 or June 14. Don't forget to go to our parties page and vote for your choice for our next theme party! Will it be a Pajama Party, Beach Blanket Bingo, a French Fete...or something else? We anxiously await your votes!

 

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