Spectacular double rainbow this evening in RTP

I'd credit the photographer, but given that he took the picture w/ his newly, ill-gotten, government-property Blackberry ... I'll save him the potential GAO audit.

Anyway, it was a real thin squall line of heavy rain & gusty winds, but immediately behind it was clear skies, thus the rainbow. Kind of a nice reminder that better weather is ahead. Softball signups start next weekend. Two months to spring training. I think I'll make it.

Recap of a long Thanksgiving weekend

Wed: Had a blast at the Turkey Open, which I guess is a long running golf outing held every year on the Wednesday before T-giving by the St. Michaels' men club. I was playing w/ two friends from the glorious 2-time champion Law Office squad and their brother-in-law from Sweden. It was Superball format and I did pretty much nothing all day until the last hole when one of our good players drove the green on a 320 yd par 4 ... and then I drained a 40 ft putt for eagle. That got us to 8 under which was good enough for 3rd place and a $25 gift certificate. Along w/ my closest to the pin win on Columbus Day, that brings my golf earnings to $50 over the last two months, which is $50 more than Tiger's won over that period.

Thurs: Slept in pretty late than headed out to Asheboro. Chuck cooked up a great turkey. I ate too much as usual. Played Apples to Apples w/ the cousins. Always fun. Proof that APD is pretty smart ... he had the card "mothers" and let all sort of very potentially funny adjectives go by (including evil), until tbKMD or Aunt Shelly played the adjective "beautiful" (or something like that) and won the deck.

Fri: APD and I started a convoluted Sweet 16 Heroclix tournament. Eight of his teams and eight of mine. We didn't seed it very accurately as the #10, #12, #14, & #16 have made the Final 4. We then went out to eat at my gift certificate restaurant (Beef O'Bradys) and the number of workers far outpaced the number of diners (the 3 of us). I felt a little guilty ... like if we left they could all go home. Eventually two more groups came.

Sat: Went back out to Asheboro to help Shelly and the kids move. Their new house is really nice. All that moving made Dolberry very sore, though.

Sun: Church in the morning. Nap in the afternoon. Watching my fantasy squad bear El Cueto's by about 70 points. Pretty much a standard Sunday. Am glad I am not a Texas fan because they jobbed in the whole BCS thing. They beat Oklahoma on a neutral field. Seriously, it's ridiculous that they can't put out a better product than what college football puts out for a postseason. I'll bet there aren't three bowls that are worth watching.

Bottom line: not looking forward to back-to-work tomorrow. 5-day weekends are too nice.

CHAMPIONS!

Well, I wish there was a more exciting story, but as it turned out we won rather easily. We had to beat the #4 seed (we were #2) twice since they had routed us last week (25-5), but I think we had the better team ... just had to play that way. And we did.

So we won the first game 12-1 in a 5 inning run rule. Dolberry the coach did not play Dolberry the player (actually, the game ended before I could get myself in). Then we won the second game (in a fairly steady rain for the first 3 innings) 12-2. Our pitcher and defense was spectacular all night. Dolberry went 1-2 in the 2nd game.

We have some guys on our team that are unbelievably good. We hit four over the fence HRs on the night (300 ft fences). And everyone on the team is a good person as well, so it was just a lot of fun.

There are no extra t-shirts this year ... sorry.

We'll be back for our third straight championship next year.

(Nathan, if you want to see the stats ... I'll e-mail them to you. I know you're a BIG softball stats guy.)

If There's a Rocket Tie Me To It

At this point in the election cycle, I'm trying to avoid anything and everything political. I've given up trying to discern which parts of America are racist (western Pennsylvania, apparently) and which parts contain anti-American Americans (thankfully not North Carolina, I guess). So, caller ID helps us avoid the robo-calls and we don't listen to the messages left behind. The mailers are glanced at on the walk from the mailbox to the recycle bin only for the amusement value ("my opponent voted for quadzillions of dollars of new taxes", "My economic plan will create a 42 million new high-paying jobs"). TV ads are tuned out or clicked away from. Fox News and MSNBC are never EVER turned on. Bulk e-mails are treated like potential viruses (deleted w/o opening). Newspaper columns from omniscient partisans are passed over. The blogosphere w/ its frenzied hordes of overwhelmingly irrational screamers is avoided like a coiled and cornered copperhead. If anyone tries to steer the conversation to the politics, Dolberry steers the conversation to softball or the weather. (OK, I do that for any non softball/weather conversations.)

So, a lot of people ask me how I pick who to vote for. It's simple, really.

I go by the jockey's silks. In the early races on the ballot (judges, sanitation commissioner, anything to do w/ agriculture, etc.) you want to take someone wearing bright colors, yellows and oranges preferably. These candidates almost always win and pay reasonably at the windows. A good example is this weekend's Breeders Cup Sprint where Midnight Lute won (pictured above). Later down on the ballot, you want someone w/ a star or horseshoe on their vest. They may not win, but they will always finish in the money (unless they are a libertarian or gelding). In the big races, you want some sort of green ... just not green and gold ... those colors are an abomination together.

My headache's gone now ...

... thanks for all your concern.

Note to bloggers everywhere: nothing will cut down on blog traffic more than a big ol' picture of Charlie Weis.

How's was my week you ask? What's it to you? Oh, you're just being friendly? Sorry it's hard to tell on these internets.

Let's see: Recapitorily, my week looked like this:

Monday: 10/13: Capital of Ohio Day. Annual OAQPS golf tournament. Dolberry's team finished last in 2005 and 2006, but we got a ringer in 2007 and did not finish last. Unfortunately, our ringer was out of town in 2008 so we went out w/ 4 "D" players and fully expected to finish 16th of 16 this year. After 4 holes we were +2 (bogey/birdie/bogey/bogey), when Dolberry went on the best 5 shot streak of golf I have ever played.

Shot 1: Tee shot on 130 yd par 3. Nestled a 9 iron to about 3 feet.
Shot 2: Made putt as leadoff putter. Team is now only +1.
Shot 3: Drive on 360 yd par 4. 260 yards to creek. Dolberry nails a drive, right down the middle, exactly 260 yards. Picked ball out of creek. No matter. I crushed that thing. Someone else on team had put one in the fairway at the 150 marker.
Shot 4: From 150 yd, hit a 7 iron to about 18 inches from hole. Ball mark was about 3" from hole.
Shot 5: Made putt for birdie. Team at even.

I returned to earth after that stretch, but played pretty well all day. We had a shot at even par if we birdied a short par 5 at the 18th. Dolberry's drive, 3 wood, & PW had us on the fringe, but we couldn't make the miracle putt. We ended up at +1 on the day. Fun times. (Oh yeah, we finished 14th.)

Tuesday 10/14: Busy day at work. Two big briefings to mgrs. of some sort. Both went ok, not great, but not bad.

Wednesday 10/15: Over the weekend I had calculated the softball stats for our team (the glorious Law Office) and uncovered, not surprisingly, that I was in the midst of my worst softball season ever ... a pitiful 10-26 (.385). (A good rule of thumb is to divide by two to get what an equivalent baseball average would be; e.g., .385 would be like hitting .192. Hello Corey Patterson!) So, we were playing the last two games of our regular season and Dolberry got 7 ABs over the two games which went as follows: line drive single, line drive single, line drive single, line drive single, HR over outfielder's head who was playing Dolberry way too shallow, line drive single, line drive single. 7 for heavenly 7! New average ... .515. (Hello mediocre Red of your choosing!). We won both games easily: 29-3 and 29-9 (pretty much everyone on our team went 7 for 7) to finish the regular season at 10-2 and in 2nd place. Tournament starts on Monday.

Thursday 10/16: Had my performance review. Am no longer outstanding. Only exceeding expectation. Not too worried about it. They can only give a finite number of O's each year. Guess it was someone else's turn this year, which is fair; we have a lot of really good workers in our group. I might have been mildly perturbed if I hadn't gone 7 for 7 the night before, but, you see, Dolberry's self-worth is tied directly to softball performance. If I do well as a husband, dad, son, brother, worker bee, youth person thingy, friend, fantasy football player, haiku writer, or HeroClix player ... well that's just gravy.

Friday 10/17: Woke up and my throwing arm hurts like crazy. Can't lift above shoulders w/o pain. What gives, arm?!? I blame this guy.

Really good article ...

This is a really good read from a great blog. Nominally, it's about the Kansas City Chiefs, but I think there's a lot more there.

Hope all are well.

Our softball team is on a streak; after starting 0-2, we are now 8-2. No thanks to me as I've been pitiful.

Work is busy, busy, busy.

All us NC Dolberries have chest colds and hacking coughs.

Lamest.post.ever

Hey, what's up with me?

Not much.

Playing some softball. We lost our first two games, but have stormed back to win 5 straight, including beating both of the teams that beat us. We're currently 3rd of 7, one game back of the leaders. I've been playing very very badly.

Our rotisserie team was horrible this year. 7th of 13. Pitiful. Our widely panned Volquez trade ended up being a net positive for the O'Jimmies, but it wasn't enough.

I'm thinking about doing another "Life Episodes" soon ... if I can think up anything else interesting that's happened to me.

The Reds season is finally over. Anyone who thinks they'll be any better next year than this year needs their optimism levels adjusted.

The beautiful KMD and APD are psyched about the ChiSox.

All this sounds negative but it's not. Things are fine here.

What I did on my blogging vacation (part 2)

Whoa, ho, I've been busy. Too busy to blog that's for sure. What have I been doing? Hmmm. Lots of stuff. Let's see what I can remember. Bear w/ me a bit, here.

Well, let's see, there was yesterday. Yesterday, I played softball. It was the State Church Tournament. 12 teams. We lost our first game, then won the next two, then lost the last one. I was 8 for 15 on the day which is about what I always do. It was a lot of fun, as always.

Before that ... I remember I worked a full week. That was tiring.

Before that ... we went on vacation to Emerald Isle w/ most of the Dolberry family. That was a lot of fun. Maybe even more than softball.

Before that ... I went to Colorado for work. That was fun and tiring. I drove into Rocky Mountain National Park which was a cool experience. If I was a better blogger, I'd have written about it and taken some pictures.

Before that ... we went to Louisville, Boone, and Evansville. It was really cool to see all the people we saw. Oh, and it was fun and tiring.

Dolberry Days

A recap of my last few weeks.

May 30: Blue (Apex) loses 14-7
May 31: Blue loses 12-11
Jun 1: Blue wins 10-7

Jun 3: Gold (Cary) loses 19-18

Jun 5: (DH) Gold wins one and loses one
Jun 6: Blue wins 18-1 to earn #3 seed in tournament (finished 8-7)
Jun 7: (DH) Blue beat #6 seed 15-0, then upset #2 seed 14-11 in extra innings
Jun 8: Blue lost in the championship of the winner's bracket 8-6. (I hit a 3-run HR in this one.)

Jun 10: Gold team won 13-6, last game of regular season finished 3rd (8-6)

So after 11 games in 13 days (w/ very sore muscles), tonight was supposed to be the start of the Cary tournament with one game if we won & two if we lost the first one. Instead, we got "smoked" out. Really bad air quality here today (code red) due to fires in eastern NC, so Cary canceled all their games. I also play on our Office team in the EPA league (though I've missed every game so far due to other conflicts). One would think that the EPA league would be canceled on bad AQ days, but one would be wrong. So, I got to play today after all ...

June 12: EPA team lost 15-8.

Tomorrow, we need to win three straight games to win the Apex crown. Any loss & we are done. I've been playing better lately, so it's been fun. No games though Saturday, Sunday, & Monday ... maybe my soreness will abate.

Hope all readers are doing great!

Maybe I've Been the Problem ...

... maybe I'm the one to blame.

I've been thinking, maybe I've been partly cloudy, maybe I'm the chance of rain
Maybe I'm overcast and maybe all my luck's washed down the drain

But when I look at the stars ... when I look at the stars,
When I look at the stars, I see someone else,
When I look at the stars, I feel like myself

------------------
Hey, ho faithful readers and longtime hail contemplators ... wzzzzup?

I'll tell you what's up here ... in snippet format. The official format of the DCV.

Names: Did you see that the SSA came out w/ their list of most popular baby names for 2007? There were some odd things as noted by the SSA data collectors:

1) there are seven boys names that rhyme w/ "maiden" in the Top 102: Jayden (No. 18); Aiden (No. 27); Aidan (No. 54); Jaden (No. 76); Caden (No. 92); Kaden (No. 98); & Ayden (No.102). (Then there were another 27 in the top 1000: Braden; Cayden; Jaiden; Kaiden; Aden; Caiden; Braeden; Braydon; Jaydon; Jadon; Braiden; Zayden; Jaeden; Aydan; Bradyn; Kadin; Jadyn; Kaden; Jaydin; Braedon; Aidyn; Haiden; Jaidyn; Kadyn; Jaydan; Raiden; and Adin.)

Raiden? Really? Kris & Tim ... I nominate Quayden before it gets too trendy.

2) "Neaveh" is the #36 name for girls. It's backwards for "heaven". I just wish Harry Carey had lived long enough to see this. Strangely enough, "Lleh" is not in the top 1000. Parents are pretty optimistic I guess, at first.

APD/School: He's done w/ 5th grade. Haven't gotten his report card yet, but it looks like he got straight A's all four quarters. And he was like U2 at the Grammys in his elementary school awards ceremony (thankfully w/o Bono's "expressive" Irish tongue) ... collecting 5 awards including Top Math Student in 5th grade and Top Reader of the School. He has been blessed w/ excellent teachers every step of the way. The beautiful KMD & I are so thankful that he's had such talented and caring instructors helping him get where he's at (not really that far ... only 6th grade ... pick it up son). Blog-reading teachers ... we salute you. Truly important work, it is that you do.

APD/Baseball: His team won their first tournament game tonight & it was exciting, 6-5. The tying run was on second in the bottom of the sixth, but two great plays by their SS & P won the game for them. They were 9th of 10, so having dispatched #8, they now get to face the #1 seed on Saturday. APD hasn't gotten a hit since shortly after Abner Doubleday invented the game, but he's playing good defense, having fun, & most importantly has a great attitude about it all ... so it's all good.

Softball: Dolberry's play has been erratic at best. More bad than good, I'd say. I have 6 games over the next 7 days, so maybe I'll get into a groove. Dolberry is currently putting a hurt on the bathroom scale and the scale has somehow karmaically retaliated against my poor heel & Achilles. Anyway, I think both my teams are in 3rd w/ similar records (6-4 and 6-5). About 2-3 weeks left in the spring season.

Work: Is fine.

Other things: Can't really think of anything else. Oh, I added another blog to my list of ones that have the Dolberry seal of approval. Enjoy! Hey, toodle-oo everybody! Thanks for reading!

Meet Your 2008 O'Jimmies

Well our softball game for tonight got rained out. Then the Hurricanes lost their regular season finale which likely means they won't make the playoffs (unless the Capitals lose tomorrow night ... and the Caps have won 10 of their last 11). If the Reds don't bounce back from this 5-2 deficit, it's going to be a pretty pitiful sports night.

Speaking of sports and pitiful, wanted to introduce you to the 2008 O'Jimmies.

Decent hitters: Reyes, Kent, Francoeur, Encarnacion, N. Johnson, Laroche, Keppinger
Not-expecting-much: Snyder, Castro, L. Gonzalez, Pagan, Gerut, Gross

Decent pitchers: Webb, Smoltz, Isringhausen, Villenueva, Volquez
Not-expecting-much: Affeldt, Gordon, Moyer, & Turnbow

The O'Jimmies have finished 1st & 2nd (of 13) over the last two years. But, as seen below, we're in 9th thus far ... I'll keep you up to date as the season progresses.

Softball is underway!

We won our 1st game (18-15). I didn't do too well (0-3, but got on twice on errors) & I made one horrendous throw trying to get a guy out at home from SS on an OF relay. It's a long season.

Why I'm posting more lately ...

One reason ... more T-giving food for me.

I noticed last year during the holidays that many of my conversations w/ assorted family members were shortened because of the advance notice on all-things-Dolberry provided by the blog. As a result, I was able to eat about 15% more than usual because of the less time wasted w/ unfilling small talk. So, w/ T-giving coming up (T minus 10 days), here's some additional Dolberry-related stuff. I will not be repeating these next week. Thank you for your consideration.

Dolberry has been very busy & has not had a chance to follow college football at all this year. I will not be prepared to talk at all about this next week, so there's no sense even bringing individual teams or games up.

I do expect to be able to follow college basketball though. That was really funny that UK lost to Gardiner-Webb. I will gladly entertain any conversations about how a team that lost to UNC by 53 last year could stomp UK at home. That is, as long as we're in line for more food. Not when I'm eating, please.

Work is fine. If you're a Republican, rest assured EPA is doing all that we can to ensure that all those aging hippies and wannabe Socialists don't ruin the American economy through some sort of sensible global climate change action. If you're a Democrat, rest assured EPA is doing all that we can to combat global warming by creating numerous and conflicting groups, divisions, and offices to design and promote sensible climate change action.

Softball is over. We won the championship. Dolberry will talk about this as long as you want. In fact, I'll go ahead and bring our scorebook. We can go at-bat by at-bat through our 15 game regular season and three-game tournament sweep. We can do this while the underlings are doing the dishes.

APD is fine. As far as I know, he will be available for questions. All he eats is bread anyway and he talks w/ his mouth full, so it's not really an issue w/ him.

I'm not on speaking terms w/ our dog, Cherish. I took her out for a run this Saturday over to the Lake. She ran about 0.25 miles than sat down and refused to take another step. Even a step back toward the car. I had to carry the stupid beast all the way back to the car. The beautiful KMD hypothesized that it was her dinner time and that she didn't feel like running as a result. Once home, she was running around like normal. BAD DOG!

The beautiful KMD is more beautiful than ever, but you'll be able to see that yourselves, so there's no sense going on about it.

I like lots of new music and bands, but I do not expect you to be interested in them. Rest assured, Dolberry is NOT interested in any new music, bands, movies, blogs, etc., that you may find interesting.

Dolberry has not followed the NFL much either. Certainly not last week or the first week of the season. No sense discussing.

If you have any other topics you'd like to pre-discuss in advance of the feeding frenzy, go ahead and post a comment. Otherwise, for your own safety, please do not get between me and the turkey. (Not Dad, the edible turkey.)

CHAMPIONS!!!

Our fall softball team won our first ever title tonight 12-11. It was back & forth all game. We went up 11-8 in the bottom of the 6th w/ three runs (all w/ two outs).

Then, the 7th inning was one of the strangest of the season. After being w/in one strike of the title in the top of the frame only to have a 3-run HR tie it up at 11, the LO had 2 out & nobody on in the bottom of the frame ... before our 7 hitter lined a single up the middle ... then JK smacked a single between short & third ... and as Mark K pulled up at 2nd base ... the left fielder ... unbelieveably .... let it roll right through his legs in a perfect Bill Buckner imitation. BIG Mark scored easily & the title was ours. Strange way to win.

Now ... sadly ... it is the offseason. Much nicer to end the season w/ a win, though. Only 130 some odd days until first practice.

Softball update

We won both games on Monday ... so we're in the championship game next Monday.

We dispatched the worst team 21-3 in a nice warmup G1. Then, we fell behind the #2 seed 5-0 after two innings, before roaring back w/ a 19-5 run over the last 4.5 innings. It was probably the best stretch of softball in LO history as we drubbed a good team. They'll have to beat us twice next Monday to prevent the first ever Law Office tournament title.

Other than that ... all is fine.

My World Series pick: Boston over Colorado in 6.

Baseball thoughts

O'Jimmies came in 2nd this year. We went into the last week w/ a tenuous lead & our guys proceeded to toss out their worst week of the year. Glavine & Reyes hurt the O'Jimmies at least as much as they did the Mets. Oh well, 2nd of 13 is pretty darn good. Not sure if anyone has ever repeated in the league. Kudos to the Senor GM.

APD's last baseball game of the year was tonight. They were the #8 seed playing the #1 seed. He came up in the 1st w/ no one on and 2 out and worked a walk (fouling off two 2-strike pitches). He stole 2nd & then the cleanup hitter got a single. APD tried to score & was called out on a bogus call at the plate. His team gave up 4 in the bottom of the first. It was 6-1 after the 2nd. In the third his team got 3 runs, including one on an APD bases loaded single. APD pitched the bottom of the third and gave up 1 run. His "D" made a great OF catch & DP to keep the damage to a minimum. Nobody scored in the 4th as the "D" & APD worked a 1-2-3 inning w/ a 6-3, K, 6-3. The last inning (time) was the fifth. The other team got 2 outs quick, but two walks and an HBP later, APD was up w/ bases loaded. (Really didn't want to see him make the last out of the game.) The pitcher blew two swinging strikes by him, but APD smacked a line drive single up the middle on an 0-2 count to make it 7-5. He went to 2nd on the throw home. Then our cleanup hitter got on on a catchers interference, but the rally ended there and it was a 7-5 loss. It was his team's best game & APD's best game. Very cool. I was so proud of him ... APD is clutch.

We won the big softball game last week ... to bring our magic number to 1, but then we played pitifully last night to fall to 11-2. Should clinch tomorrow as we play the winless team.

My MLB playoff picks:

Phillies over Rox in 5; D'Backs over Cubs in 3;
Indians over Yanks in 4; and Angels over RedSox in 5.
--
Phillies over D'Backs in 5;
Angels over Indians in 7.
--
Angels over Phils in 6.

Early 2008 predictions: Reds in MLB; O'Jimmies in LCL.

Heydilly-ho bloggerinos!

Not much up here.

Softball team is 10-1 (w/ 5 to go). If we win tomorrow, we all but clinch the regular season title. This would be the first Law Office title in 8 years of trying. Yay for us.

APD's team broke a 5 game losing streak w/ a tie tonight. APD gave up 2 runs in 2 IP, but actually pitched really well striking out 4 w/ no walks. The other team had some good hitters. He also played some good defense at 3B. He walked all three times up.

Work is ok.

Not much is up in Apex either. There was a flasher who got arrested. That's been the oddest thing lately. Let me know how many "Keep Apex odd!" t-shirts you want. $14.99 per shirt.

We're sweating out the last week of rotisserie baseball. Currently, the glorious O'Jimmies hold a beyond tenuous 0.5 pt lead. If we were to hold on, it would mark back-2-back championships. Our geezer brigade of Glavine and Moyer let us down tonight. Ideally, MLB would decide that the season should be cut short by 5 days.

Worst. Entry. Ever.

Rampaging bull loose in Apex!

Yay. Another crazy Apex story. Loose bull last Friday. Eluded capture for some 6 hours. Well done Bone Collector.

It was a draining week at work. A two day weekend was not enough refilling.

Our softball team is in first. 5-1.

APD's team is 2-2. They lost two 1-run games this week (3-2 and 4-3). He pitched three more scoreless innings (6.2 on the season w/ no runs). Plus, he went 2-4 and made three putouts in the field. We have (ahem) an arrangement in which there are benefits if certain milestones are hit. It is working too well. APD came off the field last game & said "You owe me big." We're trying to recommunicate that it's not a job.

Can't believe UL only lost one spot in the rankings.

The ever-increasingly beautiful KMD & I celebrated our 15th (crystal) anniversary this week. I offered to download a Crystal Gayle song from Itunes for her, but she said no thanks.

Hey, I turn 41 tomorrow. Joy! Thanks to all for putting up w/ me, some if not all of those years.

Hey, sorry I haven't blogged in a while

Not really that much to say ...

We had at lot of fun at the beach w/ the Burbach crew. The temps were nice & hot (at one point the heat index was a crazy 125F) & the water temps were pleasantly cool. And of course the company was nice.

I still feel great satisfaction upon tinkling in the newly restored toilet. More pride than I've felt peeing since I was two years old ... ok three .................. all right seven. Are you happy?

We were helping the beautiful KMD w/ the dishes tonight (a very rare occasion) & I was washing, Alex drying, & tbKMD was putting away. I was telling Alex how when we were younger, Aunt Kathy always washed, I dried, & Kristin put away. I said I thought drying was the easiest job. Alex agreed & then added why did you have the easiest job being the oldest ... implying my skills should have been applied in a tougher role. The beautiful KMD & I both laughed out loud.

Softball's started this week, but it's been a strange bummer. Our first opponent forfeited & the team we played tonight was the worst team I've ever seen. They had trouble catching the even the easiest pop flys. We scored 21 runs in only 3 innings before the mercy rule was invoked.

Hope all readers are doing grrrreat.

Holiday from Blogging

Hey, a lot's gone on since I last blogged ... here's a quick update:

June 1: Mom, Dad, Tim, Kris, & Mojo came in from Louisville for trip.

June 2: Went to Carowinds w/ TCC youth group. Much fun. It rained on us despite my assurances to all that it would not (for about three hours). Saw the Newsboys which is always nice.

June 3: Headed to Emerald Isle w/ the extended Dolberry clan. Caught up to the tail end of former Tropical Storm Barry. Swam in the pool in the rain. Ocean was a churned up.

June 4: Am sure we had fun on this day. Can't remember exactly what we did.

June 5: I'm gonna say we went golfing on this day. None of the golf was that memorable. APD and Sparky impressed at times. Scott & I hit a (curiously stupid) fish with our drivers.

June 6: Maybe we putt-putted and go karts on this day? I remember I lost at putt-putt. G'Ma won.

June 7: More fun at beach. I think I clinched the pool battle royale between KMD & I on this night. 3 nights to one.

June 8: APD and I made a cool sand stadium that got wiped out by a rising tide, despite numerous Dolberry forecasts that it would not.

June 9: Sad goodbyes to beach clan. What a great, relaxing, fun trip. Blow was softened by returning to a softball game. We only had 8 players and got pounded. I'm too out of shape to play OF in a 3 OF alignment.

June 10: First game of Apex tournament. We lost to #3 seed (as #2 seed) 14-9.

June 11-12: Two crazy days at work. Catching up from a week off & trying to prep for three more days away.

June 13: Headed out to Boulder/Denver for conference. Got to see Aunt Jane, Uncle Mike, and Jeannine, Shannon, and Michelle (and families). It was very hard to see Aunt Jane so sick. Was so glad to hear she was able to be returned to Louisville & hopefully will be transferred to a rehab center soon. As sad as it was to see Aunt Jane, it was equally happy to get to see all the (former) Fitzgerald cousins and their families. What a great group. I'm proud to be related to 'em.

June 14: My day to lead the conference and give two talks. Think it went well. Ate dinner in downtown Boulder. Boulder is always nice ... even the time I went out there for a job interview at NCAR and totally bombed the seminar I gave. Once the bombing was complete, I went and drove into the mountains which saved the trip.

June 15: Left Boulder at 3:15a local time to get back for our softball tournament that night. Plus, I was able to catch a show from a band that a YG member drums for. The key to good softball is waking up 2000 miles away, flying coach most of the morning, going to a smoky bar for loud music, than playing ball from 8-11p. I was 4-4 w/ two walks and flawless SS defense in two St Andy's wins (17-12 and 19-6).

June 16: Unfortunately, Catholic Blue team ran up against Baptist Blue and they beat us again. 9-6 this time. I had a chance to get us into a tie in the 5th, but flew out w/ 2 outs & a runner in scoring position.

June 17: Fathers Day was nice. I was treated to Philly Cheesesteaks for lunch & we had a TCC picnic that evening. Started to itch from poison ivy contracted presumably from yard work the day before.

June 18-21: Everything basically settling down. Over this month I applied for my own job and got it. So, I'll be switching over from NOAA to EPA sometime in July. It's only a slight raise, but is good to be actually working for the agency I've always done work for (if that makes any sense). The humorous bureaucratic thing is that I'll be on a 1-year probation (again) & they're doing a background check on me. I told HR that if there was anything worth stealing; I'd have stolen it already ... which they didn't think was funny. I itched profusely over these 4 days and moaned unceasingly to KMD and APD.

June 22: Went to doctor and got steroids. Immediate relief. Went swimming w/ APD and KMD. Very much fun. Hung out w/ some friends that night.

This weekend was fine. Went to Harvest Crusade w/ youth group. Other than that, just relaxed.

There! You are now all caught up on the tediousness that is Dolberry!