Well, it was a noble try.

Katie's team lost 6-2 to the team from Niles today in the finals and finished second in the league, which was pretty good. :) But they were missing two players and it was the balls that were hit to the places where there were no fielders that resulted in most of the margin of victory.

I'm very proud of them all.

Gretchen says that the end of today's semifinal softball game was like the end of a movie and that I have to write it up for my blog. I, of course, will attempt to comply.

But I don't have the scorecard. All that I have is my faulty memory. It will have to suffice.

We resumed the game at both teams' home field, Chippewa Park, after the game was called on account of darkness after seven innings with the score tied 2-2. I don't know how well the managers and coaches of the other team slept, but comparing notes on our side, we discovered that none of us had slept well and we were all up early.

There was barely enough chalk left in the locked supplies bin to chalk the infield foul lines -- certainly not enough for the batter's box! And why should there be? The season was over and there would be no more games played there.

Well, there was another theory blown to heck. :)

One of our co-managers, Laura, had called in and made sure that we would have an umpire for the game. He showed up shortly before the scheduled start at 10 AM. We compared notes on the rules -- a darned fine idea after yesterday's game, where a critical play turned on an extremely fine interpretation of an ambiguous rule (which was, in my opinion, ultimately called correctly) -- and we were off!

Both teams had blown through all the available innings on their best pitchers, since pitchers at this level are limited to three innings per game. So it was into the depth on the pitching staff. Happily, we had some. Sofia had pitched a good seventh the previous night and proceeded to give us a good eighth and ninth inning. Both teams had scoring chances, but neither scored.

I had told the girls before they started today that all they had to do was play good defense and they would win, because they were good hitters and they would eventually hit. And the defense on both sides was being just good enough. Coach Michelle had set our lineup with the best infield defense, which put tall, reliable McKayla at first, quick Katie S. at second, and strong-armed Elia and my Katie at short and third. Outs were recorded in all manner of ways. Katie snagged a foul pop-up at one point. At another time, a hard shot bounced off her and into foul territory. The third-base coach for the other team called for the runner who had just advanced from first to second to run to third. And Katie recovered, grabbed the ball, and tagged her out easily.

I recall too that the opposing pitcher caught a short pop-up on the infield with two out and the bases loaded when I came in for coach pitch in the bottom of the ninth. And their catcher caught a foul pop. There were good defensive plays all around.

Came the tenth inning and we knew that Emma would need to come in to pitch, Sofia having exhausted her available innings. I had looked at the lineup and had realized that we could keep the infield defense intact by rotating up the middle, bringing Emma in from center to pitch, moving Sofia from pitch to catch, and sending Ava from catch out to center. So that's what I told them to do, not having actually consulted with Coach Michelle first. (I apologized later.)

I don't remember exactly what happened in the top of the tenth, but we got through it without giving up a run, although there were at least a couple of base-runners. I remember the bottom of the tenth pretty vividly. :)

I need to pause to explain to you about "coach pitch". At this level of our local girls softball, when a pitcher gets a four ball count on the batter, instead of issuing a walk, the opposing coach is called out to pitch. The coach can throw three pitches; the batter gets up to three swings, getting as many swings as they had strikes left on them in the count. So if the count was 4-2, then the coach throws three pitches and the batter gets one swing. A foul ball on the last strike is a do-over.

Watching Katie and later Julie as well play at this level last year, I reached a conclusion about coach pitch: a large percentage of the difference between the teams can come down to whether or not the coach can throw hittable pitches. And my theory about hittable pitches is pretty simple: not too fast, minimal arc, and in the strike zone. And please do not bounce the pitch on the plate, because that is going to require a miracle to hit.

(Come to think of it, one of our girls actually did hit a pitch from the opposing pitcher on the bounce today. I forget which girl... :) )

So I don't want to buzz the ball in there, but I do want it moving fast enough so that it's not dropping rapidly as it crosses the plate. It's a fine line. But I am an old junk ball softball pitcher from my days of pickup softball in grad school, so I can usually get two of the three pitches in the right zone. And that means I can usually avoid striking out my own team. :)

I had started the season handling the coach pitch, then had been moved to first base coach, then I got bronchitis and lost my voice, and went to keep score on the bench. As scorer, I used fifty years of experience at filling out a scorecard to help us position the girls better on the second time through the order, because girls at this level have a strong tendency to hit the ball to the same zone all of the time.

And now, after a long journey, I was back at coach pitch again for the end of the season and the playoffs. I hadn't had to do a lot of coach pitch in the current game, because the opposing pitchers were throwing a lot of strikes. So were ours. And the girls on both sides were hitting or striking out off the opposing pitchers, keeping the coaches on the bench, which is almost always the best thing for the team on defense.

Katie was leading off the bottom of the tenth and worked the count to 4-1. I got the ball and walked out to the mound. (I am too old to "trot".)

"Make it good, Dad," Katie called out. "You know where I like it."

And I tossed it in and got it to a good enough spot. Katie hit a hard grounder through the hole between first and second base, past the drawn-in right fielder onto the outfield grass. With the ball in the outfield, runners can advance until an infielder controls the ball on the infield. And I shouted out, "Go two!"

(Yes, I know this is the job of the first base coach. I am, however, probably the loudest person on the field when I don't have bronchitis. :) )

And Katie zipped into second. So we had a runner on second, nobody out, and now the force was off at second. Force plays at second and third are the bane of the offense at this level, as many hard-hit balls that would put you on base with no one on are much more easily converted into force outs.

Next up was McKayla, one of the two authentic power-hitters on the team. Earlier in the game, McKayla had doubled and Katie had scored the first run of the game from first base, because Katie is fast. Any sort of hit into the outfield was likely to win the game right here.

And McKayla got under the pitch and lofted a pop-up toward second. Katie took a few steps off the base. A crowd of girls converged.

The ball hit the ground.

Katie, listening to Coach Mike at third, scooted over there. McKayla was safe at first. First and third, nobody out. No force at home, and now the infield will have to come home with the throw, because Katie is the winning run.

Alondra was up next. She got in some good cuts and fouled a couple of pitches off impressively, but ultimately struck out swinging. One out.

Elia strode to the plate. Elia has more raw power than any other girl on the team and owns the team's only homer of the season. I badly wanted to get the chance to coach pitch to her.

I didn't get the chance. She found a pitch to her liking and lined it to short left field. It was hit hard enough that it bounced off the chest of the girl who tried to catch it. Katie scooted home, avoiding the catcher who was standing on the plate.

I was standing right behind the plate on our side of the fence and I wasn't sure she had actually touched the plate as she danced across it.

"Touch home," I told her.

She went back, tagged the plate, and the umpire signaled safe.

I guess I did have one thing left to do in the game, even if it wasn't coach pitch. :)

The game was over. The Lightning won, 3-2, and are advancing to the finals tomorrow to play the first place team from Niles. They get to play in Bandits Stadium, the professional fast-pitch park over in Rosemont, which will be a kick.

But it was a great game. And either team could have won. They both played their hearts out.

We'll see how it goes tomorrow. One of the other coaches on our team characterized this game as being like the U.S. vs. Russia semifinal hockey game some years ago -- it was the game that both teams really wanted to win.

The one thing that I am certain of: this was the longest game in the league this year. :)

Katie's team played a heckuva game against the other remaining Des Plaines team in tonight's semifinals.

It isn't over yet. The game was called on account of darkness with the score 2-2 after seven innings, one more than regulation.

We'll resume tomorrow at our Des Plaines home field at 10 AM.

Sleep is for the weak and sickly, I suppose. :)

Katie's team played against the Lincolnwood team tonight in their first round of the playoffs (Katie's team had a bye during the play-in round) and won 15-3. This means that tomorrow they will face the other surviving Des Plaines team in the semi-finals.

Fingers crossed! Today, we were blessed with good pitching, good defense, good hitting, and a lot of hustle! That will take you a long way. :)

Tonight, I headed down to Wrigley Field and watched the Cubs beat the Padres.

Tuesday night, there is a Windycon meeting.

Wednesday night, Katie has softball practice.

Thursday night, Katie's team has the first game of their playoffs.

Friday night, if Katie's team wins on Thursday, they will play again.

Whee!

I have spent a fair amount of the weekend trying to finish up some code for the upcoming release at work.

I have also managed to believe that the pitching clinic that Katie was supposed to go to was today instead of Saturday. Saturday, sadly, was correct; I was not.

I am sure that I have brain cells, but I think I need to work on the auxiliary memory.

Tonight was the Des Plaines Girls Softball outing to the Bandits game. The Bandits are a women's professional fast-pitch softball team that has won their league's championship two years in a row. Sadly, their luck was not good tonight as they gave up five runs in the first inning and lost 5-0, but everyone -- especially the girls! -- seemed to have a good time.

Some additional notes on yesterday's softball game:

Katie had two hits, including one where she hit the ball towards first base, but hustled down the line so quickly that she rushed the first baseman to the point where she couldn't make the play. Thus, the value of speed and the general encouragement to run!

So when you're handling coach pitch, you head out from your dugout and the opposing catcher (usually) flips you the ball. The opposing catcher in this case had been drilled to make her throws crisp, which they were. This was a bit of a surprise coming at me from a distance of less than 10 feet. It was rather worse when one of the throws caught me in the knee. My good knee, or at least the one that has not been surgically repaired. Fortunately, it caught me just to the left of the kneecap, or it might have done some serious damage. As it is, it's just a bit sore today.

The girls on Katie's team did a fine job of hitting off of the opposing pitcher yesterday. This is a good thing. :)

The regular softball season for Katie's team, that is. They won today, beating the Skokie Schwarbies by a score of 8-2. Elia hit a big three-run home run (the team's first of the season) to give the team a 3-2 lead and they scored five runs in the fourth to win going away.

The Lightning finished in second with a record of 9-2-1, going 9-1 after an initial loss and tie. They are an impressive bunch of girls.

Playoffs start on Tuesday, but finishing second in the ten team league will mean a first round bye, so the next game is Thursday. Fingers crossed!

The good news is that Katie's team won their next-to-last game of the regular softball season today by a final of 2-0. It was mightily hot when the game started; not a whole lot cooler when we finished, but the sun was down and there was a breeze.

The bad news is that the air conditioning at home failed today while I was at the softball game. We have a call in to our A/C guy; I hope we hear from him in the morning. I am sure that he has a million other calls right now.

*sigh*

In any case, I have managed to log into Gretchen's email and extract, print, and fill out (the last by hand) the forms that we need to have for Katie and Julie's dance camp that starts tomorrow morning. There are still a couple of items that need to be added, because for one reason or another, I don't have things like the phone number for the girls' pediatrician.

Because that is not a computer thing. That is apparently a Mom thing. :)

In other news, I think that I have figured out how to solve my computation problem at work. Now, I just need to spend a day or so coding it and testing it out to see if the algorithm that I have in my head actually produces the right results when reduced to electronic impulses.

But I think I have an impulse to wait until later -- like tomorrow -- to sort this out...

Katie scored tonight, although not in the way you might expect.

I took her to tonight's Cubs/Rockies game down at Wrigley Field. Having seen me running the scorebook at her softball games from time to time (which I would refuse to give her :) ), she asked if she could help me score tonight's game. And on the way down to the ballpark, I explained how the fielders are numbered from one to nine, and what a "K" meant, and other bits of scoring esoterica.

And then I gave her the scorebook at the game.

She scored about a third of the game with my help, which was pretty good.

Maybe we can keep scoring from becoming a lost art after all! :)

Someone elsewhere in the larger group ran a lint-like tool against our Java code today and sent us the list of complaints. Most of them were actually real problems. I fixed the ones in my area and sent the others off to the developers working in the other areas, because I could fix the bugs, but why deny them the valuable learning experience? :)

About the time I was almost finished bug hunting, it was time to take Katie off to her softball game. Her team won 3-1 over another of the local teams, scoring two runs in the bottom of the last inning before the game was called for time.

If I'm counting correctly, her team is now an impressive 7-2-1. This is not good enough for first place, but it is definitely good for second. :)

Katie's team got to play on the big fields over at Rand Park today. They had a good hitting day, scoring 2 in the first, followed by the maximum allowed of 5 runs in each of the next two innings on their way to a 12-3 victory in 3.5 innings.

When they hit, they hit.

Sam and Bonnie came by today to finish the fence. With some help from Katie as we hammered in pickets, the fence was finally finished and Ruby the Dog could be released from her tether. This made the poor dog very happy.

Afterwards, I took Katie off to her softball game against the Skokie Indians. Her team won 6-0. Katie did well, getting two hits, driving in two runs, pitching well, and snagging a humpback liner at shortstop for the first out of the last inning. (The rest of the team did well too, but I only need to tell you how well Katie did. :) )

Today was Katie and Julie's last day of school for the year. I have not had a chance to look at their report cards yet (because of important reasons appearing on next rock), but Gretchen tells me that they are very good. I am appropriately proud. :)

Katie's team met the team from Norwood Park today at Chippewa, which is our home field.

It was an unusually close and low-scoring game which Katie's team won by the final score of 2-1, with Katie driving in both runs with a first inning double. And she got the game ball, which made her very happy!

And I'll just say that the Norwood Park manager was everything that I like to see in a manager at this level.

It has been extraordinarily busy here for the last few months. It was thus that we found ourselves coming up on the end of the school year and having not yet written a song for Katie's teacher, Mrs. Sharko. We knew what we wanted to write, but actually putting pen to paper was being challenging. We had had discussion on the subject with Katie and Julie. We had nothing actually written down.

And then on Thursday night, I started my vacation.

And at 3 AM I woke up Gretchen and rapped out a verse to her.

"Can I go back to sleep now?"

"Yes. Yes, you can."

Not much later, but much more awake, we managed to finish pulling everything together. While performing the song as a rap was a possibility, setting a tune to it was going to be a better choice. :)

And today, Katie was able to take the recording of the song to Mrs. Sharko, who likes it.

It is only deadline that would get me to record something with this case of bronchitis... :)

Anyway, here are the lyrics:
( Lyrics inside...Collapse )

The weather today was good, so the softball practice that had been called for Katie's team worked out well. Only about half the girls were there, but it was a holiday weekend and relatively short notice, so that was just fine.

I wasn't sure what we were going to be doing later in the afternoon until someone at the practice mentioned that our neighborhood pool had opened this weekend. So off to the pool we went, where we splashed around for a couple of hours.

After dinner, I hit both grocery stores and came back with deli meat which was rearranged into a variety of sandwiches and sandwich-like foods, including the Reuben that Gretchen made for me. I greatly appreciated this, because eating a Reuben in a restaurant is a crap shoot, given the chance of sulfites in the sauerkraut.

And now, we are hoping to get everyone to bed soon. We'll see how that goes.

Katie has now embarked upon reading the first of the Harry Potter books herself. She got the book from the library yesterday and is already up to chapter six.

Gretchen has suggested that I not tell her that we have all of the books in the library downstairs. (And two copies of book six, because I decided that neither of us needed to wait for the other to finish it that way. :) )

Thanks for all the lovely birthday wishes!

Julie was home from school sick today with a tummy bug, which made things more complex. She's feeling better now and we're hoping she'll be able to go on the school's field trip to the Lincoln Park Zoo tomorrow.

I have the head cold Katie had over the weekend, which is not a plus. :)

The roofers probably will not return until Thursday, when the rain is supposed to stop.

But happily, Katie's softball game was canceled, which is much better than playing in rain and slop. (Especially when I have a head cold...) The next game is Thursday by which time things should have dried out a bit.

My new VM almost works. My old VM goes away in an hour or so. It would be good if we could move past almost soon...

And now it is time for bed.

Time is once again failing at its basic mission, because everything is happening at once.

I have at least one critical bug that I need to fix for work. This means that my vacation plans for the week (which were without form and void) are completely up in the air until that's done.

However, my old work VM goes away very early on Wednesday morning due to a hardware upgrade at work, so I have to get the new VM up and running with everything I need transferred before then.

And Katie has a softball game tomorrow afternoon if it doesn't rain (which it may).

And, despite the fact that I seem to be coming down with Katie's cold, I went to the Cubs game tonight.

And tomorrow is my birthday. :)

Oh, and they may or may not be back to continue working on the roof tomorrow, depending on the state of the rain.

Chaos! It's not just for breakfast any more!

Yesterday's softball game was canceled, which was a good choice, as it had rained much of the day, so the field was not only on its way to becoming a quagmire, but it was the sort of wet cold outside that would have made everyone thoroughly miserable. As a result of the cancellation, we all got to attend the Ice Cream Social at the girls' school. This made everyone very happy.

There's a raffle there where various of the teachers and parents have donated prizes for the benefit of the PTO. I bought raffle tickets for Katie and Julie and let them distribute them as they chose through the various sacks that were collecting tickets for the various items. Katie didn't win anything, but happily Julie won the thing that she really wanted, which was a chance to spend a half day with Mrs. O'Brien, her former first grade teacher, in her class.

The Book Fair was also finishing up last night and I bought a couple of more books that Julie had asked for, because, well, books! (And chapter books to boot...)

Now, if only Katie hadn't picked up a head cold...

I appear to be, at least somewhat, back in Julie's good graces. Of course, it helped that I had heard the argument she had with her mom a few moments before and had an idea of how to make her happier.

Meanwhile, our roof replacement, scheduled for tomorrow, has been delayed as the high winds have put everything behind. But soon! Soon, there will be a new roof!

Julie apparently hates me again.

We had a make up game today for the girls' softball team. Our team won, 5-0. Katie pitched two innings and got a big hit to drive in the last run.

Julie decided she did not want to play today. We're trying to encourage her, but it is being difficult.

And, in a moment, I'm off to Wrigley Field to watch the Cubs play the Yankees. :)