Optimism is good...

… and it is the bedrock of my outlook and personality. However, regardless of how I may want to perceive and conduct my affairs I must accept reality when it rears its ugly head sometimes.

I last reported my record was 5-2. Giving my readership something to look forward to, I predicted I would finish the season strong. That did not happen.

I did win my next match, but I was not even close to my usual playing form and played someone that could never ever beat me. Cool – now I was 6-2 and things were looking good. I have shook off the Carlos incident and put two more wins under my belt.

A week after my second straight win, I played three matches and lost them all within 36 hours of each other. I'll comment in detail on the first match and give the outline on the others!

I played an opponent I beat last season, but again I was not close to my normal playing level. (I will get to that shortly.) I can beat this player, but I dropped the first game 15-13. I came back in game two and won 15-14. This is the part that will bother me for a while... a league rule I was not aware of until this match just killed me. To be honest, it is just another rationalization I came up with to compensate for my playing shortcomings!!

I opened up the match with the serve. I won that privilege by hitting a lob shot closest to the short line. Every league match starts this way and I love my serve as an opening welcome for the opponent. I work pretty hard to get this lob almost every match. In my head, I also thought I got the benefit of serving game three. The tie breaker game is needed if players split the first two games of the match. Well, up until this point I guess I never had this problem or people were as clueless as I was on this day. The rule in league play is simple. The player with the most cumulative points of game one and two gets the serve in game three. I was short one point and psychologically I was ready to open game three up 4-5 points as is the custom when I get the serve! I was even in the box ready to serve when he informed me. I shook it off and opened the game down 3 points. (I know – I know - nice way to shake that off!!) After a pretty good game three I lost 11-9. I was really pissed for two reasons. #1) I could beat that guy and did not. #2) I purposefully did not play at 100% since I had back to back matches. I should have taken game one when I had a chance and this third game would have never have even come up.

I do not know why I approached that game thinking I could play half ass and still win. I never schedule back to back games since I am not the kind of player that can do that. I play my game… it takes about an hour (usually) and if I play another game for fun great… I do not have to be concerned with my energy level.

My second match was versus someone I have never played before in singles. I have played them in doubles and cut-throat (3 player game) and won easily or outplayed them. I really figured I could pull a back to back off and come out okay. I thought entirely too much!

To my opponent's credit, SHE played a great game. She watched my loss vs. my first opponent and saw a couple of things to press in our game. To her credit… she pressed them very well. #1 almost as if she planned it, she deliberately made me run, which I did because I wanted to win and get it over with. In hindsight I was masterful… and like a little wooden puppet I ran. She hit shots that were never intended to gain a point; unless I chose not to run after them… when I did I easily put them away. I took game one 15-7. I won the game but lost the war. As if I hit a brick wall, I could not play at any level after that. The tactic of hitting the shots away from me worked extremely well in game two. When ever I got the box I got my points, but I just never got to the box much. I dropped game two 15-5. Yes, I lost my chance to open up game three, but she was also dead tired. (No – she did not play an earlier match, but who cares at this point.) I could not beat a child in that third game. I was taken out, by a woman, 11-4. I was beside myself and I have not been able to remedy it. I had to play the next day and lost in straight game 41-5.

Why: I do not play regularly anymore. I have not played regularly in 8 weeks. When you are not in the best of shape, you cannot afford to layoff and return to form quickly. I am not compensating for my lack of play time with anything… which is also not very good.

I need to get to the gym when I can… if there is nobody to play then I need to go work out on the treadmill or bike. If I do not do those things… then I will be going backwards in skill.

Incidentally, my overall lack of time has affected a couple of other things… I get home for work and after the kids and the house are done… the Mrs. And I crash. I have been going to sleep closer to 9 pm. I do not play my beloved Xbox anymore or at least consistently, nor WoW, or really anything. It is a sad time for us, but the summer is getting to everyone. The kids have so much energy and without school to drain them of it… we are left with task. I am not complaining about this… as I love this part of my job! I think this is all related… I need to increase my exercise to increase my energy level! That will start now.

P.S. I have a chance to get even with everyone in the tournament. That starts in September, so no excuses if I start increasing my exercise today!

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!

Down 9-13 and a magic 8 ball somewhere reveals...

"Outlook does not look good!"



If you recall from my earlier post, "3-0" I talked about my next three games are going to be rubber matches, where my season will be defined. Victor, Carlos, and Troy are the names of my opponents.



Yesterday, I was scheduled to play Victor. The first stop on this three game tour. Victor, before yesterday, had a record of 1-2. Not all that impressive, but I knew who Victor played and lost versus Carlos and Troy. Victor can play, but he is still shaking off rust from a few years of not playing.



Victor played Troy and lost 2 games to one. Victor could have beat Troy, but Troy eventually made adjustments and took him out. Victor lost in straight games to Carlos. By all accounts, Carlos is highly athletic and will track down shots most won't get to. I'll chat about Troy next week. My most important match for the season.



Back to Victor and an outlook that just was not promising. I was down all of game one. I never hit a shot I was truly impressed with. My serve was hit early and I went away from it. Victor had control and was closing out game one.



Down 9-13 and a magic 8 ball somewhere reveals 'outlook does not look good' for me. I call time out. A friend was there watching the game and pulls me aside. Rick asks me, "what the hell am I doing? You are not serving consistently and you are playing like shit. You can beat this guy."



Man I felt like I had a coach in that instant. Kinda like an insignificant wake up call, but he was so right. I break serve after the timeout. Victor hits my serve again gets a side out and quickly picks up match point on a service ace I should have hit. I call timeout again. Rick says nothing. He starts to walk away... about twenty feet away he mumbles, "go ahead and mail it in loser."



That was all I needed. Like a shot of adrenaline - I got back on the court facing match point and I just did my thing. It was a long rally, but I broke his serve. I got back in the box and the rest is history.



I served the ball extremely well. I did not change a thing. I lined up and just hit the ball. Victor only put a racket on three shots for the rest of game two and I ended those points after he returned those few shots. I went from down 9-14 to game one winner 15-14. I also officially broke my in ability to comeback from being down at least 5 points.



Victor was beside himself. Pacing, having a conversation with himself, seriously I was a little shocked with his reaction to the close of game one.



Game two starts exactly where I left off. I did not change a thing and really the game took as long as I would expect when I just serve after serve after serve. I closed the door on Victor with a 15-2 decisive victory. This game was all about the effectiveness of my serve and not getting cute trying to mix it up. I also found my stoke with a host of mid to long range kill shots that just did not present well in game one.



4-0 with two games to make up already.

I broke down... I am still a bit shocked...

After all this time gaming on xbox live, I finally broke down and purchased a video communicator. How could I avoid it when I essentially got it for free?

I have heard of people replacing their headphones a half dozen times and with each story I use to chuckle about how my original works just fine. Prior to my 360 headset, my original head set with the origianal xbox worked forever. Even on that console, I heard about heat sets getting busted. I thought it would never happen to me... well that was until MJ came to town.

My youngest is truly unique in almost every way from my other two children. She has an uncanny ability to react completely against logic and anticipated moves. There was this one time I came home from work and due to schedule and some plans I had not seen her in three days. (Settle down people... I saw her plenty but not while she was awake. Every night I spend times with my kids watching them sleep - sometimes a moment or just a few minutes, but I love to see them perfectly at peace sleeping. Call me crazy!) I hate doing this, of course, but sometimes it happens. Well, when I did eventually see her, MJ ran over with zeal screaming Daddy. I lovingly pick her up and gave her a big hug. In this instance, I remember specifically getting a hug in return. Microseconds after the hug, I pull back and prompt her for a kiss...

WHAM - WHAM - WHAM!! Yes, that would be me getting smacked across my face three times by a 1 year old with precision accuracy. Yes, she is a girl fellas. You would think it was programed into her DNA regarding technique and speed needed for the perfect most painful slap. Mind you she is one... well after being stunned from my apparent boxer in disguise, I held her suspended in mid air away from me... only for her to start crying. Wait a second, who just took three right hooks from Joe Lewis again???? ME - and she is crying. In my heart, those slaps were an expression of I miss you Daddy. How dare you leave me for three days for the birds without love or hug. Five seconds after the pelting, I was getting my usual hugs and kisses and she pretty much forgot all about it.

Friday night was that day and what drove me to my suspicious purchase.

There I was sitting in my office playing some good old Splinter Cell Double Agent. Like so many times before when I game prior to the house going to sleep, my kids would take turns coming in and out of the room. My two oldest clearly know that when Daddy is in the zone, please do not disturb. They can yell and scream, but they know not to address me or present a want or desire as I am not taking requests at these moments. Friday, MJ joined the circus that runs around the house and frequents my office on the route. She came in screaming Daddy and I immediately stop playing, picked her up, got my hug and kiss (minus the right hook) and promptly put her down and continued my game. Everything is fine! There were at least three rounds of this and finally I stopped picking her up. Dad needs to set the rules and boundaries, right? As I expected, she started crying as she viewed me talking into my headset and not paying attention to her. She switches tactics and starts holding her arms up for a hug while tears stream off her cheeks. I pick her up for the last time, I tell myself, and again with lighting speed she grabs the headset and literally yanks it off my head throwing it to the floor. I go to put her down and my other two kids ambush me and divert me from my immediate intention to recover my headset. Too late, MJ has it and she is running. Some how she gets half way across the house and I find her jumping up and down on my head set in the kitchen. This is how these things break. This is why mine never does. I am very protective of my gaming tools since I use them quite often. I get it back and stop playing, yes I got the hint, and attend to my little ones.

Later that night, my headset stops working. It kills the gaming night, at least socially, and I head off to bed.

The next day I go to best buy. I am seeking a head set. Nothing more.

I find the accessory aisle I need and locate the head set. Enter the BB salesman.

After brushing him off as no help needed, thanks he buts in and says the killer phrase. I can give you that head set for free if you wanted.

How can I resist that? Is he gonna steal it?

Brian told me about this package. I blew him off too, at least in my mind. I wanted the damn headset - nothing more.

Basically, there is a neat package where you can buy a head set; xbox live gold account for one year; video camera; two arcade games (Uno and Robotron); and 200 Microsoft points all for 77 bucks.

The head set was 25 bucks.

Uno and Robotron are 800 ms points each.

Xbox live gold account for one year is 65 bucks.

The video camera is positioned as free, but for my sales man it was 49 bucks.

To boot, I also get 200 Microsoft points which is like 10 dollars.

How could I say no? The head set is free and for this logic alone my purchase made sense. I will be buying a lifetime of xbox 360 live accounts. My next one is due in September. The one included does not expire until July of 2008. (What I did not know was: can I apply it to an existing account... this may present a small problem but with a happy ending if the worse case was to play out.) I already have Uno, but my brother does not and it is the perfect gift.. Muhahahaha!

Getting back to where I was originally headed with my post... I have made fun of so many people with the dopey xbox live video camera... and now I have one. What I did not know was my good friend has one so now our kids can chat live. Little B and my eldest should get a kick out of that.