Racquetball Update

I'm 5-2 with three games to go. I will certainly be seeking to go undefeated the rest of the way. If last nights game was any indicator, then I have found my stroke again.

I'll get to my loss to Carlos in a min.

Tim was the opponent last night and it started off pretty rough, but that is sometimes the case. Tim's whole game are precision short shots. Tim jumped out 9-1 on me and I simply adjusted and took some chances that created a blow out. His shots were good, but not that good. I crashed the front court. After each shot, I simply ran up and proceeded to take his game away. Tim needed to make an adjustment and hit some passing shots or at worst some ceiling shots, but nothing offered took me out of the front court. He never scored another point in game one and I took it down 15-9. The second game was 13-1 when I decided to chill, since I thought I was playing back to back. As it turned out, my opponent asked not to play that night, but next week. Apparently, he was watching my shots and wanted me to cool off a bit. (Okay that probably was not it, but it sure feels good to think that way!!) The match was concluded with a 15-6 win.

My match with Carlos, a week ago, is a game that will haunt me for the rest of the season. First off, he was 30 min late to the match. After he arrived and warmed up we started our match.

First serve, first return, I was set to hit a shot off the backwall. I turned and nailed it. Probably as hard of a shot as I can hit on a given day. The problem with this shot is it hit Carlos in the head. To be more specific, I hit the side of his head right above his ear and he went down - hard.

Anyone that plays racquetball knows that you could be hit or you could hit anyone at any given time. With all that said, hitting a player usually happens once a match. In some games, it could happen 2-3 times a match. I have never hit anyone in the head. I have never seen anyone get hit in the head. Let me just say, that I am not the hardest hitting person in our league. I am the hardest hitting person in my division and probably pretty well known for it. How hard you hit the ball is only as good as your accuracy. I give away power to make my shots all the time.

I connected with this shot. I did not let up at all. Carlos went down hard and did not get up for 5 min. Poor Carlos... poor Carlos as he just stayed down on the floor and I was pretty shaken up about it. I seriously could have killed him... racquetball physics I will not get into, but what I do know is a racquetball has a double impact. First it strikes something, but then the ball compresses together and recoils in a millisecond and effectively hits you again, but with more pressure.

On TV during the US Open, slow, still shots of the pros hitting on average double my best speed show a violent event. The balls are literally get ripped apart. The pros go through a dozen balls in a game. In our league, a ball lasts maybe three or four games before it breaks.

So there I am not feeling to hot about myself and there is Carlos still down on the court. After a few more mins, he starts to get up and seems okay. More shocking than me hitting him is Carlos asking me to continue the game. I basically told him, there is not way I am getting on the court again today. After that shot, I do not feel very confident I will be playing my game. We should reschedule. Carlos then tells me that he does not want to reschedule, I barely hit him and we need to play or I need to withdraw.

Well, I was not going to withdraw and we started up play again. I never hit another shot anywhere near him again and I think he knew it. I was just interested in taking the risk of hitting him again in the same game. We played and I played to lose. Carlos seemed pretty happy with himself, I was content at the time avoiding further injury.

Well, I lost. I will crush Carlos in the playoffs. I probably should have just withdrawn.

She's Two; She's Two; My little Angel is TWO!!

You wanted a post... here it is.

Yesterday, my little girl turned two years old. It was a fun day. The party was fun and she was totally digging all the attention. With each new gift, the audio and visual was priceless... awww.. I am gonna miss not having a one year old ever again.

SAC and I were talking about it after everyone left, as my little girl grows up we will never have what she was ever again... We have mixed feelings both positive and negative about it.

The big hit was her baby doll. I do not think she has put it down yet.

Troy is good. I am now 4-1.

As it turned out, I know Troy pretty well. He plays challenge nights fairly often. I knew his face. I knew his name from the schedule. I just did not know the two were one in the same.

Now, if I knew Troy was "Troy" I would have given him alot more credit and sorta predicted this outcome. He is not a purple level player... Troy is right now as good as I hope to get. Troy is a Bronze player or three up from where we are now. Troy had no trouble with pretty much anything I threw at him. Progressively and with speed, he picked up point after point on his way to a 15-7 and 15-4 win. I do not think there was much of a challenge, although a few spectators said I was playing quite well. (Not very encouraging when someone says you played good and you still got creamed!)

• Great drive serve to all parts of the court.
• Great Z serve to my backhand.
• Great court presence... seemingly everywhere I wanted to put the ball.
• Killer - meaning he rarely needed more than once chance to hit a kill shot and end a rally.
• Probably the most important - great backhand passing shots.

I have no doubt he will finish 11-0. Second place in this case is my only alternative...

Transformers

This is not an editorial review.



The movie was entertaining with several hokey parts that could have been edited out. I liked Even Steven as the main character. It was youthful enough for me to identify with, yet actually performed well considering...



Here are the considerations:



Transformers can squash humans without even thinking about it. Other than certain types of weapons... what does a Transformer really need to fear??? I ask this since several times on film Transformers, even the almighty Optimus Prime, was viewed ducking machine gun fire. Machine gun fire, even a truck load of it, would do no damage to an Autobot. C'mon Michael Bay... at least talk to a few journey men that watched the cartoons growing up.



I give the movie a B-. I also liked the battle scenes Transformer vs Transformer. Those parts are really the best elements of the movie. Aside from the opening scene with a Decepticon, the human assaults were rather sad.



I do think Megatron was totally sold out. Megatron was almost as important as OP, but in this movie his focus was too much, his role was too small, and in the end his popularity was never showcased. Seriously, how could they have a Transformer movie and not have any emphasis on StarScream taking Megatron and shooting him as the ultimate weapon. Eventually, when Megatron is snuffed out... I know how could I blow the surprise... (its your fault for reading is blog) the manner in which he was is all that matters. Megatron, the mighty and evil ruler of the Decepticons was defeated by Even Steven. Talk about an ending that simply blows...



With all that said, my rating holds, which means the other parts were good enough to compensate the massive holes in the story line.



P.S. Megatron stands at what? 95-120 feet tall... he was killed by a 5 ft nothing human...? The item used to kill him was within inches of Megatron and he made no attempt to take it? The whole movie was about the Decepticons need for this item. Megatron could have picked up the item and flew away as a jet... OP was out of position... or all that was required was for Megatron was to place his foot on Even Steven and snuff out his insignificant life.... that is all - and he could not do that?



P.S.S. The scene with Bumble Bee strapped to the back of a Tracker Trailer Tow truck driven by little Miss criminal was just so absolutely cliche!