Spring Volleyball

Today was the first day of Spring break for most of the students here in Ridgecrest. At least that is what the pubic schools call it. The private schools gave the students the day off for Good Friday. Regardless, the students had the day off and so did I, so we played volleyball.

We were originally scheduled to have practice tonight from 6PM to 8PM. But several of the girls wanted to go to the movies tonight, so I moved practice to 10:30 this morning. We also moved the venue from the indoor gym to the park.



This is one of the few things I like about living here in the desert. It is March 21st. The second day of spring. In certain parts of the United States they are shoveling snow, suffering floods, and just dealing with the wrap up of a long cold winter. Here in Ridgecrest we are playing volleyball in the park, in shorts and tee shirts.



I made the girls run one lap of the park at the beginning of the practice so that we could call it a practice. After that I tried to get out of the way and just let them play volleyball. They played 2 on 2, 3 on 3 and some 4 on 5. I stepped in to even out the sides for a while but was saved when one of the younger girl's older sister showed up and took my place.

It was a beautiful day, warm, no wind and everyone had fun. We all decided we have to do this again soon on a Saturday and make it a family event. Parents, siblings, BBQ, and volleyball. Sounds like fun.

R.I.P. Arthur C. Clarke

Arthur C. Clarke passed away early this morning. While I rarely listed him on my list of top 5 authors. He was always on my top 10.

I was required to read Childhood's End when I was in high school. It was one of the first full length Sci-fi books I ever read. I was disappointed. There were no space battles. I few years later I had to read it again for a class in college. I enjoyed it a lot more the second time around.

I never really cared for 2001 - A Space Odyssey, the book nor the movie. But I loved Rendezvous With Rama and it's sequels.

Many people who have never heard of, or read any of Clarke's books may have heard of him from his three "laws" of prediction:

1. When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
2. The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
3. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

The first law provided sci-fi fans countless of hours of entertainment when Arthur C. Clarke and Issac Asimov would start discussing this theorem. But then anytime those two men were in the same place hilarity ensued.

I respected Arthur C. Clarke for his choice to live the last 58 years of his life in Sri Lanka. He could have been swamped by adoring fans throughout the western world if he chose to. He chose not to. I liked that.

For those of you who may think, "Ok, so he wrote a few sci-fi novels, big deal." Arthur C. Clarke is universally credited with developing the idea of Communication Satellites in the 1940s. So the next time you use your cell phone - Say thanks to Sir Arthur.

Home From San Diego

On Friday night, my oldest daughter and I drove down to San Diego for a volleyball tournament. We stayed at the Doubletree Golf Resort in Poway which seemed like a nice place, but we were not really there long enough to tell. Dinner that night was at a nearby Claim Jumper Restaurant with two other players and their parents and the coach and his Dad. We had a great time and a wonderful meal. I had the prime rib, medium rare. It was a delicious birthday dinner. My daughter ratted me out to the others that it was my 50th birthday. So they had the waitress bring me a slice of grasshopper ice cream pie with a candle in it. I was so full from dinner that I could only eat a couple bites. But the players at the table took care of the rest of it for me.

Our tournament the next day was held at the Epic Volleyball Club which is a fantastic facility. I got a chance to play there at the Starlings Directors meeting back in December so I was glad my daughter got the chance to play there also.

Her team did really well, they won all three matches and only had to play one three game match. Some of the games were close, but unlike other tournaments they managed to stay focused and finish off their opponents. Best of all in every game they played they looked like they were having fun. That was a really pleasant change for this team.

After the match the whole team went back to the Claim Jumper Restaurant where the coach paid off his bet with his players. The evening before he had promised his players that if they won all three matches that day he would bring them back there and buy them one of the giant mondo supersized six layer chocolate cakes that they serve there. The cake was big enough hollow out and sublet to a couple college students. It was delicious.



Everyone there got a half a slice of cake, and most of us took half of it home with us. I think the coach still had enough cake to take home with him that the girls will all be having some tomorrow after practice.

The drive home from San Diego was definitely a contrast in environments. When we were in the restaurant some of the girls were talking about going down to the beach to play some beach volleyball, but when we walked out of the restaurant it was overcast in the direction of the beach and there was a sharp cold wind blowing. So we decided to wimp out and just head for home.

Ten miles up the road we were driving under blue skies



and enjoying all the wild flowers that were growing along the road sides.



For the next 2 hours I drove in scattered rain showers that varied from a light drizzle to a downpour so loud it woke up my daughter.

Then suddenly the rain turned white.



Then everything along side the roads turned white.



Then in just a hour further up the road we were enjoying a wonderful sunset and driving home under a mostly clear night sky.



Without a drop of rain or a flake of snow to be seen.

50

Oh Crap, I just turned 50.

Well other than being a little tired, probably because it is midnight and I am still up, I don't feel that much older.

The only thing about turning 50 that bugs me is that I don't get the food discounts at restaurants until I'm 55. If I have to be over half a century old I should at least get a discount on lunch.

Since my daughter and I have to leave for a volleyball tournament in San Diego tomorrow (I guess it is actually today now) and my wife has to go to Lancaster to bring her mother home from the hospital we won't be able to have a birthday celebration until later. Earlier this evening my dear wife and kids stopped by the end of my volleyball practice with a carrot cake to share with my players. They all sang happy birthday to me. Even though it was a day early it was a good birthday celebration.

Mandatory No. 2

We played in SCVA Mandatory No. 2 on Sunday, March 9, at El Camino College in Torrance CA. We were the number four seed in our pool and therefore didn't have to play in the first match. So we left Ridgecrest at 5 AM that morning. With only one brief stop in Mojave on the way down we arrived at the college just after 7:30. This was a pretty pleasant trip, nice roads, not much traffic and other than some fog once we got into the LA area the weather was clear.

Going into this tournament I had been harping on our players to concentrate on the volleyball games and not spend so much time worrying or wondering about any extra-curricular activities that may have been planned for the day.

Unfortunately they didn't come to this tournament any more focused than before. I don't know if it is just their age, or what, but most of this team still thinks that club volleyball is supposed to be a social event. Meaning that you don't do anything without standing around for a half an hour talking about it first. Prime example was trying to get the girls out side the gym to warm up once we all got there. I called out to them and said "Ladies, lets go" and motioned for them to follow me. Then I walked outside, where I had to wait until they all eventually wandered out the door. Once outside they immediately circled up and started talking again. I got a couple of their attention and motioned for them to keep following me. Then I walked around the corner to the area I had selected for our warm-ups. Then I waited there for a couple minutes with about half the team wondering where the rest of them are. Finally I started the few girls that were there warming up and just added the rest of them into the group as they eventually strolled (while chatting together) over to where we were.

Our first match of the day was against a Bakersfield Club Jamba team. Watching the other teams in our pool warm up and play I had already decided that this was going to be our tough opponent of the day. Then half way through our first game I was starting to re-evaluate my decision. Our Starlings team started that game playing like a team who has finally come to a tournament to win. We were serving well, everyone was moving, and talking. Our passing was spot on and hit were dropping in also. We very quickly ran up a 20-13 lead over this team. Then just as fast as we started in this game, we stopped. We stopped serving, passing, moving, talking and spiking. Suddenly my volleyball team turned into 6 spectators to a very one sided volleyball game. We lost the game 23-25.

For the second game I tried to get my shell shocked team back into focus and playing again. But it was not to be. The second game was a complete repeat of the end of the first game. Except for serving. We did serve well that game. But since we were not rallying the serves didn't do us much good. We lost the second game 12-25.
Our next match was against a Beach Cities Volleyball Club team. We started out slow and static again, but fueled by a couple good service runs we managed to make the game close. Too close. We took a slight lead at 23-22 but then started reverting to our old slow ways. Several of my players seemed to sense that victory was in our grasp and really tried to keep the team moving. But we just couldn't put this team away. Eventually after several lead changes we lost this game 29-31. The longest game this team has played so far in their short history.

My players seemed to take this close loss personally and really roared onto the court in the second game. This game looked a lot like our first game. We started out playing like we were invincible. Then once we got a big lead we slammed on the brakes, stopped moving and let our opponents scramble back into the game. However, unlike the first game, this one we managed to end before our opponents mounted a full comeback. We squeaked out close 25-21 victory for our first win of the day. Unfortunately it was also our last.

The third and deciding game of the match was never close. We changed sides of the court when our opponents were up 8-2, we went on a mini run of points right after the side change, but eventually lost the game and the match 8-15.

After a one match break, we stepped onto the court to play what I thought was the weakest team in our pool. This team, called TCA, had beaten the Beach cities team, but and been manhandled by the Bakersfield team. We spotted them a 7 point lead to start the game, then actually started playing some volleyball. Unfortunately we were playing trade points volleyball. Finally down 19-12, one of my 7th grade players woke up and decided to start playing, from the service line. Using a wonderful mix on top spin and floater serves she fired off seven service aces to tie the game up. But once they finally managed to return one of her serves we were through. We lost the game 22-25.

That loss seemed to just end the day for my players. They stood in the huddle before the next game and were saying all the things you would want to hear them say. Unfortunately it was all just talk. Because once the game started there was only talk, no action. I used one time out early and struggled to find some new words to explain to them that they were not moving at all, and that just standing in place and reaching for balls that came near them was not going to work. But like the rest of the day they were either, not listening, not hearing, or just not caring. The continued to play their own special style of stand around volleyball until the game was over 11-25.

This one game win, 0-3 match record day was the worst day for us as a volleyball team. Unfortunately the blame for today must rest firmly on my shoulders. I obviously have not been getting through to these girls. So I am in the process of revamping my training schedule, and my practice plans. What we are doing is not working, so I have to try and find something that will. I have until 6 PM Tuesday night to do so. Wish me luck....

Now That's Just Wrong

I feel very guilty about just how funny I think this video is.

Hawks and Doves

My dear wife and children always put out birdseed in the winter for their feathered friends that hang around here when the weather gets a little chilly. Mostly we have doves that congregate in the backyard and several little finches that like the thistle seed they leave in the front yard.

The downside of their kindhearted act is that our neighbor's cat which thinks of our backyard as his own personal litterbox and dove buffet occasionally goes after the doves there. The other preditor that seems to like the doves in our backyard is a hawk. Well the entire family pretty much agrees on one thing, we don't mind feeding the hawk, but we want the fleabag cat to stay the heck out of our yard.

This evening just before dinner was ready my oldest daughter was sitting at the computer when something thumped pretty hard into the glass patio window. I looked up to see what my daughter had thrown against the window when a second larger object also hit the window.

The first thump was a dove in full flight. The second thump was the hawk who seemed to have a lot more control than the dove. The dove stunned itself when it hit the glass, the hawk didn't. The result of this daredevil game these birds were playing is right here.



The hawk sat there for a few moments kneeding his dinner with his talons. The dove was still twitching so we think the hawk was finishing off the dove as well as securing his grip.

We were going to watch the feast, but the neighbor's cat decided to get involved. It hopped over the fence and the hawk too off with his dinner. Which was too bad. I can't get close to the stupid cat, so I keep hoping that the hawk will take care of it for me one day. I would love to see this hawk winging his way across the backyard with the cat riding where the dove is in the second picture.

The Dungeon Master Dies

E. Gary Gygax, the man who invented Dungeons and Dragons died yesterday. Rumor his it that he was not eaten by a red dragon.

I started playing D&D back in 1976. The original rules were published in 1974, by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. However my fellow gamers and I didn't waste much time on Gary Gygax's version of D&D. We very quickly bastardized several different gaming systems to make our own version of the D&D which we played all through college. Yes, I was a total geek in college, you didn't think I started acting this way just recently did you?

Once I got out of college I got a chance to try playing regular old Advanced Dungeons and Dragons the way E. Gary Gygax intended it to be played. I hated it. But for three years it was the only game in town because none of the gamers in Amarillo TX were willing to try the system my friends and I had used in college. So for three years I languished in Gygax hell.

When I moved to Ridgecrest I was reunited with one of my old gaming buddies and I immediately joined in the gaming group that he was playing in. Getting back to the good old system from my college days was like a breath of fresh air. Gaming was fun again. Then we discovered a role playing game called Runequest and we never looked back. We played role playing games every Friday night for anywhere from 5 to 10 hours.

During the 18 year period from 1976 to 1994 I suspect the only thing I spent more time on than playing role playing games was work, but only because I had to do it 8 to 9 hours a day.

In the early 90s things started changing around here. Many members of our gaming group moved away. We tried bring guys into replace them but they were too Advanced Dungeons and Dragons oriented. In order to play Runequest, or our old made up version of D&D you had to be willing to role play and to think. You couldn't solve every problem by killing everything that moved. After several years of struggling with Gygaxian gamers who were only interested in playing AD&D I finally gave up and quit the group.

This was a total cold turkey split for me. No 12 steps, no patches, no programs. I went home filled three boxes with every piece of role playing paper or information I owned and shoved them into the corner of the attic, where they languish to this day.

I should dig some of that stuff out some day. I may have a few books in there that could have some resale value. In the late 80s my gaming group and I went to the Origins Gaming Convention in Los Angeles. On a total lark, we all entered the AD&D tournament they were having. I decided to not take the game very seriously and was just trying to entertain the the other players at the table. I think I succeeded marvelously. By the time the tournament ended I had most of the onlookers giggling and muttering "I can't believe he said, or did that." Without even trying I finished up the tournament in second place. Later I was wondering around in the market room trying to figure out what to spend my winnings on when E. Gary Gygax put in an appearance. Immediately all my friends started insisting that I use my winnings to buy the latest AD&D book that had been released and then get E. Gary Gygax to autograph it.

I have never been a big fan of stars. I'm not a autograph seeker. In my lifetime I only ever collected a few autographs. I met Rory Calhoun in a restaurant in Rapid City when I was a kid. I got to meet George McGovern when he was running for president. I got to say Hi to Ken Curtis one year at Frontier Days in Cheyenne. I have a baseball signed by the Oakland A's team including Vita Blue, J Catfish Hunter and Reggie Jackson. The only autograph I have that I really enjoy having is a hand written note and a signed copy of Chicago's Night and Day album, signed by Jason Scheff, the base player.

But in most instances I found that meeting some famous person to be kind of a letdown. They never seemed to live up to everyone else's expectations. E. Gary Gygax was no exception. I picked up my book and my friends shoved me over next to him where he was having his picture taken with one of the Convention organizers. As I held out the book, he glanced at me and snapped "I don't have time for autograghs." So I used that opportunity to try and escape what I found to be a very uncomfortable situation. But before I could shoulder my way through the crowd the convention organizer grabbed my arm and told Gygax, "Gary, you will love this guy, he placed second in the AD&D tournament and had everyone in stitches in the process."

E. Gary Gygax gave me a bit of a fish-eye stare, then snatched the book out of my hand, scribbled his name inside the cover and handed it back to me with a muttered "nice job kid." Then he walked away, taking the enormous crowd of admirers with him.

I went home, tossed the book on a shelf when it sat untouched until it ended up in a box in the attic with the rest of my role playing stuff. I don't even remember what book it was. I only knew it was a hardback AD&D book that I was never going to use to play games.

In the end I should say something nice about the recently deceased Mr. Gygax. I didn't like his game and I didn't like him. But he did create a game that got me and my friends started on a hobby that caused us to waste 1000s of hours over the years. Certainly I could have used that time to do more constructive things. But what the heck, I had fun. Sure it was geek fun, but even geeks are allowed to have fun occasionally, aren't they?

Survival

A couple more tests to check my ability to survive in situations that may happen any day now. Good thing I am prepared.

78%

This information won't do you any good however, because when the zombies attack if you show up on my front door looking for help I will assume you are just one of the I-wanna-eat-your-brains crowd.

80%

I have a nit to pick with this test. My answers exactly matched NASA's result except the last three items on the list which NASA thinks are "worthless" or "not needed". So I my score was down graded because I couldn't figure out which of the useless items I needed the least. But then again this is NASA, the same people that have not been able to get us out of low earth orbit for the last 25 years.

Should I be worried that I am apparently better informed on how to survive on the moon than in my own backyard. However, if the zombies attack on the moon, I'm all over that.

Booze Exam

I don't know whether to be impressed or depressed with the results of this test.

98%ALCOHOLIC

As a guy who doesn't drink much nor often, and doesn't drink exotic stuff I did quite well on this test. I have never tried over two-thirds of the alcohols in this test,so the results may be just be the result of a mind full of useless information that I will never be able to use to earn a living. The information certainly didn't come from personal experience.

Flu

I have managed to avoid catching the flu, that everyone around me seems to be sharing - until now. Monday afternoon I started feeling a little out of sorts. I had a tickle in my throat and my chest felt a little congested. By the time I went to bed Monday night I was running a low grade fever.

My fever broke around 8 Am Tuesday morning. Then came back again by mid afternoon. Last night when I went to bed it was 102.5. This morning it was only 100.2. Around 11 this morning my fever broke again, then it was back around 2PM, and gone again by 4PM. It is just a little past 5 now and I'm starting to feel chilled again. Oh boy...

I have sick leave to stay home and I am doing that. I have someone lined up to handle my volleyball team practices for the week. But I really hope I get over this before the weekend. My 14s volleyball team is scheduled to play in San Diego on Saturday. The thought of sending my girls off to play without me is just killing me. I know that my girls will be fine without me, their parents will be there, and once the games start my team is pretty self sufficient. I just need someone to keep track of the pace of the game and to call a time out if they get into trouble. But I like to fool myself into thinking that they need me there, even if they don't.

Naval Bullseye

Yesterday the Guided Missile Cruiser, USS Lake Erie, launched a STANDARD Missile 3 at a failed spy satellite that was falling out of orbit. The Lake Erie scored a direct hit.



I worked on the STANDARD Missile program for over 19 years. I never had the opportunity to work directly on the SM-3 Program. I spent most of my career on the SM-2 precursor. But I loved seeing the old program have this kind of success.

I hear a lot of people complaining about the cost of this exercise, around 30 million dollars. There is also a lot of hand wringing about what the rest of the world is going to think. It seems that a lot of people are worried that the rest of the world is going to see this as a threat. I think that the world would be yelling a lot louder if we let this satellite fall out of the sky and its fuel tank full of hydrazine didn't burn up in the atmosphere.

If the rest of the world takes a close look at this shot and sees that we fired one shot and hit a school bus sized object that was 150 miles away and moving 17,000 mph and decides that maybe they should not try shooting at us then I'm all for this kind of show boating. It doesn't do much good to stand around telling the world that we have missile defense capabilities if we don't have the ability to occasionally step up and prove it.

Gen James Cartwright, Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, provides further information related to this successful operation in a longer video.



Note this video is about 27 minutes long and may take a while to download.

Las Vegas Invitational

My oldest daughter and I got home from Las Vegas last night around 5:20 PM. We were both tired, and we think she is getting sick.

This morning (I had planned on taking today off work) she is still in bed - sick.

We left for the Las Vegas Invitational Tournament Friday morning around 10 AM. We picked up our three passengers (a parent and two other players). Then we hit the Trona Rd. heading for Las Vegas. Since it was a holiday weekend I had no intention of getting anywhere near I15. The last thing I wanted to deal with this weekend was a highway full of idiots from Los Angeles all trying to get to, or home from, Las Vegas as fast as they could. So we went through Death Valley to get there. The drive wasn't too bad. The road is a little rough in spots, but the lack of traffic sure make up for that. Sure it took a full four hours to get there. But I'll trade that extra 30 minutes on the road for only seeing 50 cars on the highway over a 200 mile stretch any day.

We got to Vegas and got checked into our Casino around 3 PM. We were staying at Arizona Charlies Casino on Decatur Blvd. It is an older place that isn't kid or health friendly. Meaning the entire casino, hotel and restaurants reek of cigarette smoke. Even the non-smoking rooms smell bad. Because even on the floors full of non-smoking rooms, people walk around the hallways smoking. So we took 9 young athletes to a three day volleyball tournament and dumped them into a smoke filled environment surrounded by sex and gambling for the weekend. Next year my daughter and I don't care where the team is staying. We will be booking a room in a motel, not a casino. We were there for the volleyball tournament, not the casino atmosphere. We're not sure why the director was there.

Friday night I was signed up to work the Unsigned Seniors Showcase. This is a two hour volleyball practice where unsigned seniors can show off their talents for all the college recruiters that were there for the tournament. I spend the first half hour serving at girls. This was exhausting. I have served for 10 or 1 minutes at a time, but never for 30 minutes. I did get a chance for a break after 20 minutes, but it only lasted 1 minuted before the coach on the other side of the court needed me to spell him. So it was back to serving again. After serving I had to toss balls to hitter for the next 40 minutes. This wasn't nearly as tiring as the serving. Actually I really had fun. After spending so much time on the court with 14s players, it was really different tossing balls for girls who really know how to hit.

The second session was full of setters. We ran a coach on three drill for about 30 minutes, I started out warming the players up for about 10 minutes, then this (much) younger coach took over and really ran them through their paces while I just shagged and feed balls for her. The second half of that session they moved our setters onto a court with several middles and two other coaches. So the three of us who had been working the setters didn't have much to do. Mostly I spent the last half hour shagging balls, and keeping people from wandering onto the courts. The showcase was fun, and I will probably volunteer to help out again next year. After all, I got a polo shirt and a $10 Subway gift card out of the deal. OK, so the pay wasn't great, but it did give me a chance to maybe help some young player get a chance to play volleyball in college. That made it worth while.

On Saturday we played in the top pool of the tournament at the Cashman Center on Las Vegas Blvd. Our pool consisted of the number one seed team in the tournament, 801 from Utah. Also the numbers 78 and 79 teams from Central Ohio and Colorado Springs, CO. Yes, we were the 156 (last place) seeded team in the tournament. Our team managed to put a scare into the team from Colorado Springs, losing the second game to them 24-26. The rest of the day was pretty much our girls getting whacked. Our second best game of the day was a 16-25 loss to the number one seeded team.

Since we had the afternoon off, and all of Sunday morning off, we took the team to the Tournament of Kings Show at the Excalibur. This dinner show was a lot of fun. It is a lot more theatrical than the Medieval Times dinner show down in La Palma. I prefer the Medieval Times show because there is a lot more horsemanship, combat skills and fighting. This show had a lot of pageantry and showmanship to it. But it was still entertaining. After dinner we decided to walk the strip with the girls for a while. Unfortunately this adventure got a bit out of hand and we ended up walking about a mile farther than most of the girls and parents wanted to walk. So by the time we got the players back to the Casino, they were all exhausted.

The next morning, no one else would get up in the morning with us, so my daughter and I rolled out of bed around 9 AM, we had breakfast at the IHop down the street, then did some shopping. We hit a couple shoe stores, and the Meadows Mall.

That afternoon our team was playing much better. We still didn't win any matches. But we did managed to take the first two teams we played to three games. Our third match was against our old friends from the Tehachapi Starlings team. This team and ours usually match up pretty well. The girls all get along and we have had a friendly rivalry going steadily since the beginning of last year. Unfortunately they were ready for us in that match and we provided them with the only two games, and the one match they won all weekend.

This last place finish in the second day of pool competition put us into flight 5a for the Monday competition. Monday was a single elimination bracket with 6 other teams. Unfortunately we showed up half asleep, with half the team starting to get sick, and we lost our first match of the day - 19-25, 15-25. So we had to hang around and keep score for the next match then we headed for home. We stopped by an A&W for lunch before leaving Las Vegas, again, to travel home through Death Valley. I was only about 10 minutes down the road when all three girls fell asleep. They only woke up as we reached potential bathroom stops when we asked if they needed to stop. They didn't, so we just shot straight on through to home.

By the time I went to bed last night the final results of the tournament were posted online. We started the tournament seeded in last place. We finished the tournament tied for last place with 6 other teams. When all was said and done, we were on of 8 teams in the tournament who did not win any matches. But, of those eight teams at least we were not one of the three who also did not win any games.

I think the tournament was fun. My daughter came home sick, tired and sick and tired of losing. The team had some troubles this tournament, but they also had some bright spots. I just hope that each of them learned something.

Wind Damage

The last few days it has been pretty windy here in the high desert. Yesterday was the worst.

I was on the way out to Inyokern with the kids when we reached a traffic slowdown. The wind had blowen over a power pole right outside of Buttermilk Acres. The pole was leaning at about 45 degrees over both eastbound lanes of Inyokern Road. I don't think it had been down long. There was one electric company truck, and two highway patrol on the scene. They were routing westbound traffic onto the shoulder of the highway to make room for the eastbound traffic that was crossing the median to avoid driving under the leaning pole.



I wasn't able to get my camera out quick enough to take a picture. But when the kids and I came back the road was still blocked and I snapped this one shot from about a hold mile away. So you have to look closely to see the leaning pole.

The detour to get home was a lot different than the detour getting to Inyokern. Both lanes of the highway were closed and most of the traffic was being routed down Jack's Ranch Road to Ward St. This was OK for a while until the traffic reached the quarter mile stretch of Ward street that is a one car wide dirt trail. So there was a lot of cars trying to go two directions on a one lane road and absolutely no traffic control. Fortunately for us we were in the line of cars that was bulling its way through while the line of cars going westbound sat and waited. I don't know how long they had been waiting, or would have to wait. With no control it could have been a long time before the eastbound traffic cleared.

Qualifier Number 3

We played Qualifier No. 3 at the American Sports Center in Anaheim CA at 3:00 PM Saturday. At least that was the plan. We arrived at the ASC around 2:15 and discovered that the morning sessions were still in progress. We couldn’t find an empty court to warm-up on so we took over the hallway in the back of the building near where the basketball standards are stored. It was kind of crowded but it gave the girls a place to pass and set for a while. We were supposed to start at 3 on courts B3 and B4 but at 3:00 the teams on those courts were just starting the second game of their last matches.

Eventually a court opened up over on the D row and hustled the girls over there to start warming up. We were about 10 minutes into a warm up and some guy and a referee come over to me and ask “Ridgecrest Starlings?” When I yes he says “You are up on court C3, right now.” Then the referee looks at me and says “I need your captains.” and walks away.

Well my girls were all on the court with me, but all their bags and my stuff, including lineup sheets in my briefcase were over in the corner with our parents. I sent one of the girls’ friends running to get their parents and our stuff while we moved over to court C3.

When we got there we found out that one of the teams in our foursome hadn’t showed up, but we were continuing on without them. So as our parents settled in to watch my girls got onto the court and ready to play. I was a little apprehensive because of how fast things were happening. I have tried to get my team into a mindset where they can play under any circumstances, even when rushed and hurried. I was very proud that they handled the situation very well.

Our first game was against Revolution 14-1, a team from the Lancaster/Palmdale area. Their coach had approached me earlier and asked if all my players had made it, since he was still waiting for two of his. Apparently they did get there before we were supposed to start playing.

My girls muffed the first couple serves to give the Revolution team a slight lead. But that is it for that game. We rolled to a pretty convincing 25-13 win. My players were serving a lot better than last week, and playing defense well. We didn’t get a chance to run much offense. Most of our points came off service aces, service errors by our opponents, or illegal rotations by our opponents. The Revolution team was running the same complex player rotation and serve receive rotation that our local high school team runs. Personally I think they were crazy, the rotation was way to complex for younger girls, but more importantly the game they play at this age doesn’t require it. It is a serve receive for older bigger serves and a game that is played a lot faster than the one we play. In the case of our match those younger player’s inability to maintain or control their overlap cost them 10 points in the first game and 7 or 8 in the second.

The second game was a game of experimentation for my team. I managed to get three of my girls to give their jump serves a try. One of them struggled with it a bit but the other two were doing well. They all three jump serve well in practice but are all afraid to do it in games. Hopefully the success they had will encourage them to use it more often. We won the second game 25-15.

Our second match was against a team from Palm Springs called Club Mojave. This team looked to be a stronger team than our first opponent. But they had a really hard time receiving our serves. We committed four serve errors that game, and won the game 25-5. In the second game our opponents got them selves collected and started playing some volleyball. At one point they had a 13-9 lead on us. But some solid serving (no jumps) and some good offensive plays finally led us to a 25-19 victory.

With the missing team never showing up we recorded a couple forfeits. So our record for the day was 3-0 in matches, 6-0 in games for a first place finish in our bracket. That finish should put us in the division 13 when the mandatory tournaments start next month.

18-1

Way to go Giants! I am a Dolphins fan dating back to 1971. So while I usually couldn't care less about the NY Giants, I was a huge fan this afternoon. I needed them to help protect the Miami Dolphin's undefeated season record.

My new favorite team, for at least 4 hours this afternoon, came through like gangbusters. The Giants upset the Patriots in Superbowl XLII, 17-14. Sure the Patriots won 18 games this season, but more importantly, they lost the one that really counted - the Superbowl.

Go Giants!!!!!

Qualifier Number 2

My 14s volleyball team played in our second tournament on Saturday. We left town at 4:30 in the morning. Drove down to the American Sports Center in Anaheim CA in time for the start of the tournament at 8:00 AM.

We were the number 4 seed in out bracket so we did not have to play the first match. We were scheduled to play in the second, third and fifth matches. We had officiating duty in the sixth match.

Our first game was against a team called Impact 14. We struggled in the first game, but managed to stay close. We lost that game 22-25. But I was hopeful. I hadn't seen that team do anything we couldn't counter, handle or out play. In the second game my girls seemed intent on proving me right. We jumped out to a small lead and were cruising right long until the game got to 21-18. Then the other team rotated a really good server to the line. This rotation coincided with my girls going just a little flat. They were down for just a couple minutes. But it was enough. I used my timeouts, and one substitution. But that didn't stop our opponents from stealing a 23-25 win from us. This Impact Team ended up finishing the day an undefeated 3-0.

Our next match was against a team from the Channel Island Volleyball Club. They had lost a close match against our third opponent of the day in the opening match of the day. We played OK but just couldn't seem to get out offense working. We lost the first game 16-25. This loss seemed to wake up my players a bit. We won the second game 25-16, and cruised through the third 15-5.

Our third match was against Conejo Crush 13s team. We probably matched up pretty well with this team as only 3 of my 8 players are too old to play 13s. For a group of 13s this team played really well. We won the first game 25-18. The second game was a different game. We just could not pull away from this team. They matched up point for point or short run for short run. We held our short lead most of the game but eventually fell behind 23-24. Then my worst fear happened. My star player rotated into the service spot. Normally this would be a good thing. But while she was setting and hitting well that day, and playing great defense, her serving was a nightmare. On the day this player, who has been a star of my middle school teams for 3 years, couldn't serve her way out of a wet paper bag. She was hitting 20% from the service line. Twice I had warned her that if she didn't get her act together I was going to make her start jump serving. Just so that she would have an excuse for missing. (btw, she has a very nice jump serve, that she is scared to us in games).

Well, this star player comes to the line, her team down one point, her opponents needing only one point to end the game, and she calmly and smoothly serves three straight service aces. I told her that I would consider that performance as redemption for the rest of the day, but I would still spend some time examining the game video to see if her serving problems in the last two tournaments was a technique or a mental problem. I'm really hoping its technique, I can fix that a lot easier than I can fix a mental one.

So we finished the day in second place in our bracket. I hope that is good enough to get us moved into the bronze bracket next Saturday. If not we will just have to play our way up during the mandatories which start on March 1st.

The only glitch in our day was some of the parents that came with us had some real trouble with the score keeping that was being done. They tended to get a little vocal when the teams score-keeping would make mistakes. Which happened a lot. I was shocked to see how little effort some of these other coach's put into the score-keeping process. Each team had to score-keep one match each day. Many of these coaches just dump a couple girls who may or most likely don't know how to keep score. Then they disappear. So we have girls who don't know what they are doing, or more likely just are not paying attention handling the scores for their opponents. In each of our games we had at least one stoppage of play in order for the referee to straighten out the score-keeping.

When the score-keepers would mess up the flip chart my parents in the stands would start yelling and pointing that the score was messed up. They were taking this personal because the mistakes were constantly being made against us. The referee we had was trying to be reasonable, but he was not going to allow anyone to yell at the score-keepers, even if they were messing up - a lot!

In the end, after we had finished our turn as scorekeepers the referee apologized to me and our parents for threatening to throw them out of the gym. He noticed the attention my girls paid to the score-keeping process, the lines and the paperwork. He saw that I stood there with my girls the whole time checking their work and helping them were needed. He also noticed that the two games we were score-keeping were the only games he refereed all day that he didn't have to stop the game to straighten out the score-keeping. He told me "If that is level of maturity and careful attention your parents have some to expect from volleyball players I can understand why they got so frustrated with the sloppy work from the other teams."

It made me feel good about my girls, and really disgusted with the half-assed job most of the other 14s coaches seem to be doing teaching their players about their off the court duties.

We got home about 6 PM Saturday night. Three of my players had a special engagement that evening. Our School was holding a major fund raising event that evening. The 20th Annual Saint Ann's School Car Raffle. The three players were supposed to show up dressed nicely and work as the "Vannas" for the night. Named after Vanna White their job is to take the ticket numbers as they are drawn off one board and move them over to another board. These three young athletes were radiant in their nice dresses and too high a heels. I was proud that none of them feel off their heels, off the stage, or asleep on the job. It was a long day for them and they did a wonderful job.

Our next tournament is next Saturday. But before then we have two practices and a lot to work on. I can hardly wait.

Berkeley Votes to Boot Marines - Update

Mark Williams on Fox News just called Berkeley the "Left wing cesspool of America."

Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina has just called for over 2 million dollars of federal earmarks to be pulled out of funding for the city of Berkeley.

“This is a slap in the face to all brave service men and women and their families. The First Amendment gives the City of Berkeley the right to be idiotic, but from now on they should do it with their own money. If the city can’t show respect for the Marines that have fought, bled and died for their freedom, Berkeley should not be receiving special taxpayer funded handouts. I am currently drafting legislation to ensure that American taxpayers aren’t forced to pay for this insult by rescinding all of the earmarks for Berkeley in the Omnibus Appropriations bill, and to transfer the funds to the Marine Corps.”

It's not every penny of federal money that we all pay to support Berkeley, but it is a start. Next they should close the post offices. After all, if the Marines have to go, then the post office should go also.

Berkeley council tells Marines to leave

According to the Contra Costa Times the Berkeley City Council voted 6-3 last Tuesday night that the U.S. Marines which have a recruiting center on Shattuck Avenue are no longer welcome in their city and that is is time for them to leave.

The council said that the recruiting station

"is not welcome in the city, and if recruiters choose to stay, they do so as uninvited and unwelcome intruders."

Personally I think that the Marines should heed the Council's request and leave the city. But along with them should go every single penny of Federal Government money that is sent to the city of Berkeley. And I mean every penny, including all federal scholarships or financial aid that is given to any student at UC Berkeley. Any federal appropriation that would be spent in, or to the benefit of the City of Berkeley should be immediately canceled.

Then let the city know that in order to get their government largess back they have to go completely back through the federal appropriations process again from square one, and they have to do it for every single penny.

It is time that idiots like those council twits learn that blind hatred and stupidity has consequences. If you are an elected official who is that stupid and so intent on sharing their stupidity as the Berkeley City Council is, then they should have to face the consequences for their folly.

Influential Rino

The UK Daily Telegraph's Washington correspondents compiled a list of the 100 most influential liberals in America.

I was perusing their list of influential conservatives when out of morbid curiosity I clicked on their list of top 20 liberals. Imagine my shock when I got to number 8 on the list.

8. ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER
Governor of California

That's right our REPUBLICAN Governor made the top 10 list of most influential liberals in the United States. To those of us who have lived here and watched Arnold the Rino repeatedly cave to the whacko left wing nutjobs in our state legislator this is not really a surprise.