13 Days Until I Report

I haven't really had a chance to keep this up to date these past couple of weeks as games have been hot and heavy. I will say that I was actually happy that Independence Day happened this week because I was glad to have the day off to rest.
My family has taken their annual time away from the house trip this week, to Utah with the youth from the church. They are hiking all over Zion and Bryce Canyon and the streets of St. George so they are having fun. I am too, but mine is dressed in a uniform and patrolling between positions A, B and C.
This week I get to work with some of my favorite people ever, up in District 71 with Dave Burt. Tonight is the Junior Baseball final. I have heard of people who do a Regional or World Series who will only work in that division of play for the tournament but I'm not one of those guys. There are enough similarities between baseball and softball that doing games either behind the plate or on the field is going to enhance my muscle memory and actually get me in umpire shape so I can deal with the cruel, cruel heat of San Bernardino in late July. Besides, I would miss baseball terribly if I only did softball and I'm at the point now that I would miss softball if I only did baseball. Funny how that works.
Funny thing about umpiring. When I do games behind the plate, I introduce myself to the catcher and if he or she is up to it, we carry on a conversation throughout the game. I have gotten to talk to quite a few decent kids over the years. While I never skew my calls to favor these catchers or their teams, there is a part of me, once the game is done, that hopes to see them either later in the tournament or on TV somewhere. Sure, 99.999% of these teams never make it on ESPN but when one does, it's pretty cool to say, hey, I was part of their journey there.
A few years back, I had a Senior team from Lemon Grove who ended up losing to Puerto Rico in the Senior Division World Series finals and I was able to watch ESPN and say, "Hey, that was my catcher. What a great kid." I do think that is part of the draw for me to do so many different tournaments at so many different levels at so many different districts - to meet good kids and work with fine adults.
So for the rest of this week I have games on Thursday in 71, Friday in 71, maybe Saturday in 28, Monday in 21, Tuesday in 49 and Thursday in 49. After that, I will spend the next 5 days with my family, studying my rotations some more from the WR tourney director, and go for some walks with my son to keep limber for the week.