Another Monday Already…

Posted on June 4, 2018 by kdarcy21

Another new week starts, Monday.  Why do weekends go by so quickly, it’s not really fair.  I am not necessarily a hater of Mondays, they happen, nothing we can do about them.

I had an uneventful double-header yesterday at Optimist Park, Babe Ruth AA league.  It was generally pretty good ball and the weather was perfect for baseball.

Tonight, I am going to look at that house in Blackie and see what I think.  Small town life could have some benefits, I am sure – I have never done it before.  Guess time will tell.

I only have one game scheduled for this week, tomorrow night down in New Brighton, it will hopefully be my one and only trip down there as it’s about a 40 minute drive from my place, presuming the traffic is good.

Wednesday through Friday of this week I will have a house guest as I look after Lita – I am sure the four dogs will be tired after their 3 days together.

Enjoy your week.

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Quick weekends

Posted on June 2, 2018 by kdarcy21

I umpired a single game today, Cal Ripken 12u. It was back in the old area that I first lived in when I moved to Calgary.

It was a decent game, we made it though 6 innings. Great day for baseball. This is the same age group that I’ll be umpiring in the World Series.

After the game I stopped by Popeye’s Chicken since I was in the area. I had chicken strips, better than KFC for sure.

Double-header for Babe Ruth coming up tomorrow morning, AA league. Should be a good day.

That’ll wrap up the weekend, it goes by far too quickly.

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Rain, rain go away…

Posted on June 1, 2018 by kdarcy21

Has rainy season started already?  I hope not but yesterday was one of those all day light drizzle type rain days.  Needless to say, the game I was supposed to umpire was rained out, all of the parks were closed.  Today is supposed to be better so I expect that I will be umpiring tonight.  This weekend is a bit of a lighter schedule, just three games instead of the normal four.  I am umpiring the Cal Ripken league as well so it will be interesting I am sure.  That park just happens to be in the south-east near the Popeyes Chicken, so I think I know where lunch is coming from.

Sunday, I am back to my regular park umpiring Babe Ruth A league ball.  Thus far, it hasn’t generally been great – I hope the quality of the baseball improved as the season matures.

I have decided that I am going to look at that house in Blackie on Monday evening, I have a night off of umpiring.  The town (is a place with 314 people called a town, doubt it) is fairly remote but it is only 15-20 minutes away from High River so it’s fairly close for shopping.  It won’t hurt to look at it and see how I like it.

Next week, Lita joins my pack for a few days.  She loves playing with my dogs and is a good girl herself, as long as she doesn’t dig in the back yard.  Hopefully, the weather will be good so they can be out and play all day – that will tire them out nicely.

Well, the weekend is nearly here – enjoy yours.

Posted in Blondie, Hera & Twix, My Dogs, Personal, Umpiring | Leave a comment

Not moving again?

Posted on May 30, 2018 by kdarcy21

I may go and look at a house this weekend.  I heard back from the agent yesterday, had some questions about the place.  The house was built in 1933 and had numerous renovations since.  It’s on a double-sized lot in a town called Blackie, in Alberta.  The population of this town is under 400 so it is tiny – not sure how I might like that.

The house is a 2 bedroom bungalow, had a large enclosed porch, huge lot and a double heated garage.  It looks like it is fully fenced, that is sort of a must with three dogs.  There appear to be a few things inside that need some care but from the pictures, is looks pretty good.

The price is right for sure, $190,000.  That would make mortgage payments until a grand a month.  All in, with utilities, insurance and what not, it would be under $1500 a month.  I could handle that quite nicely.

I would have to likely go onto Okotoks for groceries and anything else I might need.  This town doesn’t look like it has much.  Guess I will find out if I do visit on the weekend, around my umpiring.

This has been a nice and relaxing week thus far – I had Monday through tonight off from umpiring.  I am back at it tomorrow in the south-east of the city, I sort of accidentally took a game at a diamond I don’t typically go to.  Oh well, I will survive.

The weekend won’t be quite as busy, just 3 games in total.

Only 6 weeks (or so) until I am on vacation, I am looking forward to it.  I am sure June will zip by as quickly as May did.

Posted in Personal, Umpiring | 2 Comments

Accountability

Posted on May 28, 2018 by kdarcy21

This past weekend flew by.  I umpired double-headers both Saturday and Sunday as well as games last Wednesday and Thursday so I just had Friday night off.  I don’t umpire this week until Thursday, so the 3 evenings free will be nice.

I found this on Facebook and often think along these lines when I am umpiring:

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There was a bit of whining on Saturday by some of the players.  Oh, you thought that pitch was outside, poor baby.  What can ya do though.

Nothing planned for my downtime this week, I will hang with the dogs.  I am sure they’d like a trip to the river, the water will be warm enough that Twix won’t freeze to death.

No games have been assigned for this coming weekend as yet, I am sure they will come today or tonight.

Not that I am counting, but it is seven week now until I am off for three weeks of vacation.  I am really looking forward to it.  Enjoy your week.

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Long weekends

Posted on May 22, 2018 by kdarcy21

As I have mentioned, this past weekend was a long weekend, Victoria Day weekend in Canada and the unofficial start of summer for many.

At my work, the offices close early on the Friday before long weekends in the summer which is an added bonus, so, the weekend was even longer than normal.

A question then – why is it that a 3.5 day long weekend seems to go by even faster than a normal 2 day weekend?  It’s quite nuts.  I’ll admit, I was busy and I suppose that’s the primary reason why it zoomed by, but, sheesh.  It’s true what they say though, as you get older, time goes by faster – or at least appears to go by faster.

Well, it’s Tuesday.  Here’s to hoping that the week goes by at the same rate that the weekend did.  Enjoy your week.

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May 24 Weekend

Posted on May 21, 2018 by kdarcy21

It’s the May 24 Long Weekend, Happy Victoria Day.

Friday night, I started the long weekend by going to a Brazilian steakhouse for dinner, all you can eat meat. It was quite awesome. If you’ve never been to one, you should give it a try. Servers come around with skewers of various types of meat and carve off pieces for you to try. They come around until you flip a card, or in our case, a cylinder over to red. Green means keep feeding me… No dessert, that would have killed me, I’m thinking they rarely sell dessert.

I umpired a double header both Saturday and Sunday. Two A league games on Saturday, both good baseball games. Sunday was AA action and both games were high scoring, low defense games. I wasn’t done last night until 945, long day on the diamonds.

Today will be a more relaxed day, I do have a baseball meeting in a bit, the last one until the fall, but then nothing else is planned.

I guess I’ll see if the dogs want to go to the park. Enjoy your day.

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The long weekend – summer is here?

Posted on May 17, 2018 by kdarcy21

It’s almost the first long weekend of the summer.  Well, summer isn’t really here as yet but May 24 is traditionally the start of summer.  It’s cold here today, 10C and supposed to rain later on in the day, but the weather for the weekend is supposed to be great, low 20’s – I will take it.

Tomorrow, the offices close early so I am done early which will be nice – bonus on long weekends that we have.  I am going to one of those Brazilian steakhouses for dinner tomorrow so I will be on meat overload for sure.  I have a double-header on both Saturday and Sunday and then we have our last board meeting for Babe Ruth on Monday, we break over the summer.  Uniforms and umpiring stuff have been given out to everyone, it went fairly well.

I umpired last night in what I was expecting to be an excellent ball game between the top two AAA Babe Ruth teams.  A total of 8 runs were scored in the first inning so it was an interesting start.  In the bottom of the 7th, the home team was down by 5 runs so it looked like it would be over but they managed to tie it up and won in the bottom of the 8th on a number of errors from the visiting team.  So, what looked like a good game at the start turned into a 2 hour, 40 minute, error-filled ball game.   Oh well, at least it didn’t rain.

Enjoy your long weekend.

 

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Zeus…

Posted on May 16, 2018 by kdarcy21

I have been on Facebook since sometime in 2007 now, so quite a long time now.  One of the features it has is called “On this day” where it shows you posts from this day in history.

Most of the time, it reminds us of good times we’ve had and shared on Facebook.  Today, it reminded me that 3 years ago my first dog, Zeus, passed away.  I was happy to see pictures and read comments from friends on his passing, but saddened that I was reminded that I lost my little buddy 3 years ago.  Blondie was devastated at the time as well, she had known Zeus since day 1 with us.  She loved him immediately, although it took some time for him to warm up to her.

Happier times now with three girl dogs who all love me – Blondie, Hera and Twix.  Thanks for almost 9 years with me Zeus, you’ll always be remembered and always missed.

Posted in Blondie, Hera & Twix, Personal, Zeus | Leave a comment

Awesome spring weather…

Posted on May 15, 2018 by kdarcy21

The weekend went by too quickly, as most weekends tend to do.  When you umpire a double header each day though, that makes things go by a little more quickly I’d guess.  I plan on doing double headers most weekends this summer, plus a game or two during the week.  It will fly by, I am sure.

We’ve had some amazing weather.  Temps have been in the upper 20’s for a few days.  It is so nice since there is no humidity and it cools down nicely at night.  It’s been dry as well, although they are calling for rain on Thursday – and I have no umpiring scheduled for Thursday so that works out for me.

Rainy season is coming up though, the second half of June, typically, until the middle part of July.  Who knows what this year will bring though.  Last summer was very warm and dry.  The grass didn’t need cutting since it was dry and dead.  I cut the grass for the first time this week and used my new weed whacker as well.  Got a great deal on a Stihl, cordless weed whacker.  Works well and has little blades as opposed to the cord.  I still hate yard work, I don’t think that will change.

Well, it’s almost hump-day, enjoy the rest of your week.

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