Softball kicked ass last night. We were the home team, and after shaking off the rust in the top of the first, falling behind 9-0 before even coming up to bat. Then we showed excellent resilience and chipped away at it. After the first inning, the nine-run barrage during which we just couldn't catch the ball at all, we hunkered down and let in just six more runs. By the time our last raps came up in the bottom of the seventh, we were down 14-13. We got the one run to tie the game, but the inning ended with me being forced out at third by a hit right to the third-baseman. So we went to extra innings and let in another run. But we didn't panic at all, scored the tying run on a throwing error by their team and moving the winning run into scoring position at third on a weak grounder by one of our girls. Our power hitter stepped up with one out and runners on second and third. I was concerned he would try to kill it and pop out, but he lined a base hit into left field, easily scoring the winning run. It was great.

Now, if we can play that way from now on, we'll be great. Our guys last year used to all try to beat the crap out of the ball and hit a home run every time up, but yesterday we popped out to the outfield maybe three times the whole game. Everything else was ground balls. Overall, we ran the bases far better than we did last year and forced our opponents into making mistakes. It was great.

But yeah...now I have work to do, after sleeping and then going to get something to eat. I'm pissed, because today is the only day off I'm getting this week, which really has soured me on working at PFW, especially since I didn't find out I'm going to have to work on Monday until, oh, Thursday. I know many of you pull one-day weekends on occasion, but this is not something I want to keep doing...if it continues, stay tuned, because I don't get compensated for this bullcrap. :)

And I have about an hour to get some work done before heading to the Sox game and then to a bar for a birthday party afterward.

I'm really psyched about the upcoming softball game. I can't wait. Just so you all know.

Yeah....I made it. Now we'll see who pays up. I got here at 8:15, and I have witnesses to it.

Woohoo! In your face Milwaukee!

Barb said I shouldn't blog and should go right to sleep. So in a defiant gesture of Solidarity, I'm briefly blogging to tell you all about the nice bet I have at work. Tomorrow, I'll have to leave work around 5 to get to Oak Lawn for softball. So I announced, knowing I'd get a reaction, that I'd be in the office by 8:30 am tomorrow. They joked and laughed, and I told them to put some money where their mouths were. Seven people put in a dollar that I wouldn't make it. So if I don't, I owe $7. If I make it, I get $7--free lunch, virtually speaking.

So I'm off to bed...thanks Barb. ;)

I happened across an old signature of mine on an email, and I need to crank this song now, because I forgot how much I like these lines..."you think that you can beat them. i know that you won't. you think you have everything. but no, you don't..." from the song "no, you don't" by nine inch nails. I'm not as lucky as Troy to have space to put an mp3 here, but if you can find it online anywhere, please do. It's a cool-ass song, at least in my opinion...some of you probably won't like it.

Well, yesterday my five-week scoring streak ended abruptly, though we won 4-1. I'll gladly take a win if I don't score. :) However, I did get a nice assist on a give and go with Kim after nearly breaking my ankles stopping on a dime to reel in the pass she sent my way. I backhanded it right back to her up in the zone and she put it right past the goalie. It was a nice play. :)

Did I mention I'm psyched about softball, which starts tomorrow? If not, I am. 16-inch softball rules. Period.

Also, for those of you who play fantasy football and care, we performed our first mock draft yesterday. That's how early we get into it here. Today we do our mock auction draft and Tuesday will be our mock draft for a yardage-heavy league. Lots of time-wasting, but I guess it's better than sitting here doing nothing all the time. Plus, it does kind of help once the real drafting rolls around for my actual teams. Even though my Ghetto Bowl team, the Battlefield Generals, sucks. Fortunately, today's certain-to-take-forever auction mock draft has caused our higher-ups to order pizza for us for lunch...so that's nice. Free lunch is always good.

Oh well...back to work I go.

Yay. Rain is good. You know why rain is good? Because it provides my gardens with fresh water, not iron-rich sprinkler water from the well at our house. I've seen what the water does to my dog's formerly-grey water bowl. It's now tinted brown inside. I think he's pissed off at me for not replacing it yet, because he prefers to drink from Autumn's water bowl upstairs. Imagine, that's what the water's doing to our insides too. Mmmmm. Yummy iron.

Anyway, I can deal with the fact that every driver in Chicago forgets how to drive when the pavement gets wet and gets scared and slows down to about 25 mph on the expressways, given that my plants are getting much-needed nourishment.

I'm such a giving person, yet I ask little in return.

Only that the broccoli and carrots nourish me later in the season. And the pineapple sage and honeydew melon sage bushes that I just planted too. They're basically sticks right now, but supposedly grow to like 3-4 feet high and 3-4 feet wide. That's a lot of leaves to dry and use as herbs. Oh yeah, and I also ask that the flowers allow me to relax in a garden-retreat type of situation whenever I need it.

I like my gardens. I wish I didn't have to leave them eventually, especially for a non-garden-loving apartment situation.

I know Eulalia will be jealous of this...maybe others too.

Our intern sits in the cubicle across the walkway from mine. He's an NU student, but he took some cooking classes (at Kendall, I think). Anyway, he took a "Chocolates and Confections" class or something like that. And he brought in his final project, on which he got an A.

It is a solid chocolate cake. I mean, it's not really a cake--it's pure chocolate formed into the shape of a hollow cake. It's dark chocolate inside, with milk chocolate "frosting." It's huge, and I'll probably be sick by the end of the day. Here's the coolest thing too. It's sitting on a square base of white chocolate, about 2 cm thick.

By far, he has earned the title as best intern ever...and I won't even debate that. Glenn wins, hands down.

It's really amazing to me how sitting at a baseball game on a Sunday afternoon can make me sooooo tired. But here I am, pretty tired, knowing the minute I hit the pillow, I'll be out like a light. The Sox won today, but there were no brawls or even brush-back pitches. That disappointed me. I've never been to a ballgame where a benches-clearing brawl broke out. I mean, I don't live for it, but considering I could've been there yesterday when a pseudo-fight broke out, I'm disappointed.

Anyway, I've got some nice sunburn on my arms. I always seem to underestimate the glowing orb the first time it hits 75 degrees and I'm headed to the ballpark. I mean, it'll give me some nice color after the burn goes away, but still, I probably shouldn't push my luck, what with cancer running in my family and all. :)

Came home and finished planting my broccoli plants. The veggie garden is now ready to roll. I wanted to do some weeding where I planted the carrots, but I just got tired of sitting there and weeding. I still have to plant my Mexican sunflowers somewhere, but I don't know where I'm going to do that. We'll find a spot, I guess.

So I'm off tomorrow, but I'll be heading out to my dad's work to find out just how much money I'll have to freakin' spend on my car. You see, the fuel gauge has been having problems, and dad says it would probably be wise to spend the super-extra money to by a new fuel pump and have it installed, given that there's about 110,000 miles on this one. So we'll see. It seems no matter what I do, I can't get a monetary break here. And I'm looking for an apartment? Jeez...