Spent basically all of today out at the ball fields, keeping scorebook for my youngest sister's recreational-league softball tournament team. It was bright and cloudless, and I've lost my sunglasses. Much sneezing was done.
Sister's team has had two days of practices together. Played today against two teams who had been together all year. So the results were kind of nasty. Four losses: 2-12, 16-1, 9-3, 2-6. But most of the damage came from one inning each game where things just went south; for the most part, the girls held the other teams to a hit or two an inning, so that's comforting. But playing an eleven-run inning at one-fifteen on a summer afternoon is nasty, and pitching or catching it is worse. Especially when you're having that bad inning and throwing 30+ pitches straight with no break. But they battled through it. What troopers.
Also I get irritated by Aloe Vera and I'm allergic to Noxema, so I just have to wait out this sunburn now. Whee!
Spent the last three days at my friend's house. He's about six months older than me and has Muscular Dystrophy, which for those who don't know means his muscles basically break down over time (should be called Muscular Atrophy, I guess) and the afflicted person gradually loses motor-skill-related abilities. It's like slowly becoming a quadriplegic except after a while you can't even move your torso around.
I've known him for around eleven years now, and he's a great guy. But because of his disease (and a few other factors) he's essentially restricted right now to watching television, playing Xbox 360 (because those are the only console controls he can still use, and his father modified a button to take over the left stick click action so he can use a scope in Tom Clancy stuff and the like), or using the computer (he has a mini-keyboard so he can reach all the buttons). He's been in an electric wheelchair for most of high, which would make this about seven years or so, and his controls just got replaced. Used to be really sensitive; 300 grams of pressure would make the chair inch forward. His new ones respond to 8 grams. I'm afraid to pilot it. (Which sometimes I had to in the past, when he was in bed.)
So I go visit him and end up playing Rainbow 6: Vegas 2 or GRAW2 or something coop like that, or LotRO, or watching movies, etc., while making sure he doesn't need much, so his parents can get other things done around the house. Did that Wednesday and yesterday. Thursday I helped his mother clean out their garage and then hung out in the evening. Got paid a hundred bucks for my trouble. So even though I said I was going to try to write for two hours a day, I haven't been able to write for four days. Or get on here. But again there are other factors.
My friend's mother is a very giving soul, and at the moment that means there is a person about my age living with them while she and her boyfriend/fiancee/something find a house. She also has a four year old daughter, which is a joy for my friend's mother; after finding out her son had MD, she was afraid to have any more children of her own. Only problem with this situation is that on the one hand you have a guy who's trapped in his own body almost and can't do much aside from visual media (or audio books), and on the other you have a healthy, active little girl who needs loads of attention. I am now a miracle-worker because I got her to nap for three hours yesterday, but all I did was take her outside and run her around a while while my friend let his hands rest from playing games (gets tiring on the muscles even doing that), and then horsing around with her from time to time while watching Mythbusters and eating lunch. I mean, she's a four year old girl. She needs to be active. Sitting and being told to watch Handy Manny or The Backyardigans or another Barbie movie or something isn't going to give her what she needs, and will probably only breed malcontent and distemper in the long run.
But again, that's an awkward situation to be in. You can't do with her what he can do, and you can't do what she needs without leaving him on his own. And her mother does work as well and is kind of beat when she gets back, so that's again something. And I love little kids (who seem to love me right back, even when I outright tell them I am a scary person), so I would help out if I needed to, but I'm not the girl's dad, and she needs one. Plus I can't always be over there. I have school most of the year, and I need a job as well.
On that note, I don't understand people who say they can't stand little kids. I mean, I understand when they're talking about second/third grade age kids who have been ill-raised and are general asses of themselves, but that's not what I mean. I love little kids about the ages of two to five, because that's about when they're still unblemished and still malleable, and just generally happy about life. They laugh so easily (something I still like to do, which garners me odd looks) and so honestly, and they'll come running up to you and do something silly just to laugh. And you have the unique opportunity to mold them into the image you want them to be, too. Even if you're not their parent, you can help reinforce good attitudes and temper the results of poor role models just by being near them and paying attention to them and hanging them upside down by their feet and tickling their bellies and . . . well, you get the idea.
And then when you're relaxing they'll just come in and jump up on you and sit down and not make a sound, just because they like being with you. So I can't understand people who say they don't like that. People love being adored; what's wrong with exerting a little effort to get someone a foot and a half high to revere you above all else in their little world?
If I ever marry, my counterpart must want children as well. I can't imagine being married and not being a father. And all power to women who want to work and want careers and whatever that really means (since I'm not even sure what having a career means for myself; I just want to work somewhere that gives me work to do and pays me to do it because that's what work is!), and I don't intend to pigeonhole someone as a stay-at-home mother and never allow them their own aspirations ever again, but I also think the mother figure is an inseparable part of the process and needs to be around the child even more than the father does. And in that regard, I feel the child's needs come before the father's or the mother's.
Bottom line, children are amazing. We all were one once, and disliking them means disliking some part of yourself past as well. And someone had to like children on some level for you to even exist.
On another note, I have had a dearth of symphonic metal lately.
