A busy few days between get-togethers, kid activities, and prepping for Thanksgiving.<\/p>\n
How about a few notes?<\/p>\n
M. has kicked off her volleyball career. She\u2019s been to one skills session and another evaluation session as the fourth graders at St. P\u2019s get slotted onto the appropriate team for their first year of CYO play. I haven\u2019t watched any of her practices, but I\u2019m hopeful that she can hang in there and make the occasional pass or serve it over the net, rather than be fearful of the ball.<\/p>\n
Last week I told her how I played a ton of volleyball in my 20s, often in two leagues at once at my former employer, and that seemed to interest her. She was especially impressed when I told her my team won the 4-on\u20134 league one year.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo did you get, a really big trophy?\u201d
\n\u201cNope. Just a t-shirt that said \u2018Champions\u2019 on it. But we wore them to the gym all the time so everyone knew.\u201d
\n\u201cCool!\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019d love it if she got some of her dad\u2019s hyper-competitiveness on the court. But I just hope she has fun.<\/p>\n
Saturday was fairly warm here, so I spent a solid chunk of the day cleaning up leaves and doing some pre-winter trimming of bushes. I was following the KU score, but didn\u2019t feel any urgency to get inside and watch as Oklahoma pounded them. Of course, when I saw how many yards Samaje Perine had, I made it inside to see his record-breaking run.<\/p>\n
A pretty pathetic performance by the KU defense, which had shown marked improvement in recent weeks. Also a shame to see Tony Sands fall two places in two weeks on the all-time, single-game rushing list.<\/p>\n
Which brings up a good story. The day Sands ran for his then-record 396 yards, it was cold and nasty in Lawrence. A lot of people stayed home as KU played a pretty weak MU team. A few of us, though, stayed through the final rush that put Sands above Marshall Faulk\u2019s record. We even slapped Tony on his shoulder pads as he walked off the field.<\/p>\n
But one friend was apparently very sick that day. He claims he had pneumonia, a terrible fever, and could barely breath. He tried to make it out the door when he heard Sands\u2019 yardage building up on the radio. But he was too weak to make it out. Or so he insisted.<\/p>\n
We still give him grief about that. We have downgraded whatever illness he had to sniffles and a tickle in his throat, while he now claims he was on death\u2019s doorstep.<\/p>\n
So, of course, I sent out a message yesterday wondering if any OU students sneezed a couple times and decided to stay in their dorm room and watch the game rather than walk to the stadium and stand in the rain for 3+ hours and thus missed seeing Perine go off first hand.<\/p>\n
Good times.<\/p>\n
A week ago we went out on a snowy Sunday and bought a bunch of new outdoor Christmas decorations. Don\u2019t worry, they\u2019re neither put outside nor lit up yet. There are plenty of people around our neighborhood who flipped theirs on over the weekend. It\u2019s one thing to put them up on a warm day when you know you may not have another chance. It\u2019s another thing completely to go ahead and turn them on before Thanksgiving. When will this war on Thanksgiving cease?<\/p>\n
I do have to admit, though, I\u2019ve already checked a bunch of our lights, I have things organized for easy unpacking on Friday and Saturday when it is time to get all the decorations out. But not until I watch my Cheers \u201cThanksgiving Orphans\u201d episode and drink something tasty!<\/p>\n
Our Thanksgiving preparations are pretty locked in. Still some cleaning to do around the house, but we\u2019ve had an overnight guest and a small gathering over the past week so a lot of the heavy cleaning has already been knocked out. We\u2019ll have 17 or 18, I can\u2019t keep track, for a late afternoon dinner. We\u2019re only doing a few of the sides and some of the dessert, so while I\u2019ll be busy getting those things together, it won\u2019t be a full day of cooking for us.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m sure many of you have been holding your breath for this news, but I believe I will begin unveiling my favorite songs of the year on December 8. This year I\u2019ll share two songs a day so we\u2019ll be wrapped up on Dec. 19, when I imagine a lot of you will be knocking off for a week or more. I\u2019m listening to the song that will be #1 right now, no hints though. The top 10 is very strong. The second ten, well there\u2019s some significant drop-off there.<\/p>\n
Boys high school basketball began last tonight in Indiana. Tonight I\u2019m covering one of my southern teams that is coming up north. I have a few girls games logged already, but it\u2019s always interesting to do the boys for the first time. The girls team I\u2019ve covered is very fast up-and-down the court, but the boys are usually a couple steps faster and it takes a quarter or two to get used to the pace so I\u2019m getting my stats recorded while also keeping an eye on the action.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A busy few days between get-togethers, kid activities, and prepping for Thanksgiving. How about a few notes? M. has kicked off her volleyball career. She\u2019s been to one skills session and another evaluation session as the fourth graders at St. P\u2019s get slotted onto the appropriate team for their first year of CYO play. I haven\u2019t watched any of her practices, but I\u2019m hopeful that she can hang in there and make the occasional pass or serve it over the net, rather than be fearful of the ball. Last week I told her how I played a ton of volleyball in my 20s, often in two leagues at once at my former employer, and that seemed to interest her. She was especially impressed when I told her my team won the 4-on\u20134 league one year. \u201cSo did you get, a really big trophy?\u201d \u201cNope. Just a t-shirt that said \u2018Champions\u2019 on it. But we wore them to the gym all the time so everyone knew.\u201d \u201cCool!\u201d I\u2019d love it if she got some of her dad\u2019s hyper-competitiveness on the court. But I just hope she has fun. Saturday was fairly warm here, so I spent a solid chunk of the day cleaning up leaves and doing some pre-winter trimming of bushes. I was following the KU score, but didn\u2019t feel any urgency to get inside and watch as Oklahoma pounded them. Of course, when I saw how many yards Samaje Perine had, I made it inside to see his record-breaking run. A pretty pathetic performance by the KU defense, which had shown marked improvement in recent weeks. Also a shame to see Tony Sands fall two places in two weeks on the all-time, single-game rushing list. Which brings up a good story. The day Sands ran for his then-record 396 yards, it was cold and nasty in Lawrence. A lot of people stayed home as KU played a pretty weak MU team. A few of us, though, stayed through the final rush that put Sands above Marshall Faulk\u2019s record. We even slapped Tony on his shoulder pads as he walked off the field. But one friend was apparently very sick that day. He claims he had pneumonia, a terrible fever, and could barely breath. He tried to make it out the door when he heard Sands\u2019 yardage building up on the radio. But he was too weak to make it out. Or so he insisted. We still give him grief about that. We have downgraded whatever illness he had to sniffles and a tickle in his throat, while he now claims he was on death\u2019s doorstep. So, of course, I sent out a message yesterday wondering if any OU students sneezed a couple times and decided to stay in their dorm room and watch the game rather than walk to the stadium and stand in the rain for 3+ hours and thus missed seeing Perine go off first hand. Good times. A week ago we went out on a snowy Sunday and bought a bunch of new outdoor Christmas decorations. Don\u2019t worry, they\u2019re neither put outside nor lit up yet. There are plenty of people around our neighborhood who flipped theirs on over the weekend. It\u2019s one thing to put them up on a warm day when you know you may not have another chance. It\u2019s another thing completely to go ahead and turn them on before Thanksgiving. When will this war on Thanksgiving cease? I do have to admit, though, I\u2019ve already checked a bunch of our lights, I have things organized for easy unpacking on Friday and Saturday when it is time to get all the decorations out. But not until I watch my Cheers \u201cThanksgiving Orphans\u201d episode and drink something tasty! Our Thanksgiving preparations are pretty locked in. Still some cleaning to do around the house, but we\u2019ve had an overnight guest and a small gathering over the past week so a lot of the heavy cleaning has already been knocked out. We\u2019ll have 17 or 18, I can\u2019t keep track, for a late afternoon dinner. We\u2019re only doing a few of the sides and some of the dessert, so while I\u2019ll be busy getting those things together, it won\u2019t be a full day of cooking for us. I\u2019m sure many of you have been holding your breath for this news, but I believe I will begin unveiling my favorite songs of the year on December 8. This year I\u2019ll share two songs a day so we\u2019ll be wrapped up on Dec. 19, when I imagine a lot of you will be knocking off for a week or more. I\u2019m listening to the song that will be #1 right now, no hints though. The top 10 is very strong. The second ten, well there\u2019s some significant drop-off there. Boys high school basketball began last tonight in Indiana. Tonight I\u2019m covering one of my southern teams that is coming up north. I have a few girls games logged already, but it\u2019s always interesting to do the boys for the first time. The girls team I\u2019ve covered is very fast up-and-down the court, but the boys are usually a couple steps faster and it takes a quarter or two to get used to the pace so I\u2019m getting my stats recorded while also keeping an eye on the action.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[52,67,56,58,144,15,30],"class_list":["post-3972","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-college-sports","tag-football","tag-holidays","tag-kansas-jayhawks","tag-volleyball","tag-weather","tag-youth-sports"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3972","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3972"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3972\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14155,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3972\/revisions\/14155"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3972"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3972"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dsnotebook.me\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3972"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}