Unexpected things

Haven’t posted in a while - there hasn’t been a whole lot to post about. But I should finally updated Cpher’s wrestling season. Last time I was talking about Cpher’s exploits on the mat he had gone 4-1 at a Saturday tournament, losing his last match - and he probably should have won that.

It was ugly after that for a while. Very ugly.

1) Lost to East Lansing 9-5 - the guy didn’t try to do much but took advantage of Cpher’s mistakes to score points. The guy kept getting warnings for stalling BUT I guess the lesson learned is that losing a point for getting warned is a successful strategy.

2) Lost to Jackson by pin in the 2nd period in the 1st match of Leagues. Cpher had beat this guy before but was never really in this match - the guy had taken him down twice before he pinned Cpher.

3) Lost to East Lansing 3-1 in the 2nd (and last) match of Leagues. This match was much more even than the first since Cpher was more content to wait for his opportunity. The ending was disappointing; Cpher should have / could have gotten takedown points with 30 seconds left and didn’t (our coaches were not happy) but the guy was able to turn it around with 10 seconds left to get takedown points and win. Cpher admitted he was disappointed he didn’t get points and kind of gave up.

4) Lost to Grand Ledge by pin at Team Leagues. Thought the ref counted the pin very quickly; maybe quicker than anything I’ve seen this year. Match was significant in that the GL guy took advantage of Cpher having to lean into him becuase of Cpher’s height by pulling backwards and snapping Cpher down.

5) Lost to Brighton by pin at Districts. He was losing 8-5 in the 2nd before getting pinned. Brighton guy used same tactic as described above; took advantage of Cpher leaning.

So that’s a 6 match losing streak heading into what could be the last match of the year; the consolation round of Districts. But….because there are only 7 heavyweights (out of 13 teams) the match has a big upside - a win here means that Cpher is guaranteed to advance to Regionals. The opponent? The kid from Jackson. Cpher’s win in December was by pin after he was down 4-0; Cpher’s loss last week was after he was down 4-0.

So, it was not a real surprise I guess to find Cpher down 4-0 at the end of the 1st period. The guy had taken advantage of Cpher’s mistakes for two takedowns and Cpher was lucky to have the period end or he might have been pinned.

2nd period starts and it is different than the 1st…it is actually different than the last six matches…..Cpher is tied up with the guy and they are trying to trip each other to take their opponent down. This goes on for 20 seconds and Cpher is the one who gets the Jackson kid offbalance and down they go - Cpher is on top and he pins him! The kid is going to Regionals!

Cpher, because he won, got to wrestle for 3rd and lost to the Brighton kid 5-1. The Brighton kid got all of his points in the 2nd period with one takedown and then a near fall and then basically turtled in the 3rd period AND stalled enough to lose a point. But Cpher couldn’t get him out of that position and that was that.

More Cpher Wrestling

Sorry, there’s a lot of it right now, so, there is going to be a lot of posts about it. It’s all over in 2-3 weeks though.

Last Saturday was the Adam Nevills Memorial tournament here in Okemos. Six teams, so 5 matches and each and every team has a heavyweight.

Match 1: Haslett - this kid was one of the first kids Cpher ever wrestled in 8th grade….he was no match for Cpher then and was no match now. Cpher admitted later he didn’t go all that hard and so the match was about 30 seconds longer than I thought it would be.

Match 2: Williamston - by this time we’ve had a chance to see the other heavyweights wrestle and I figure Match 3 will be the hardest. Cpher again does what he does and pins this guy in less than a minute

Match 3: Mason. Cpher got lucky here - the varsity heavyweight was off at a college visit. He’s undefeated this year and we weren’t under any illusion that Cpher would be the one to end that - it would have been fun to watch though and see how Cpher could have competed.

Mason’s #2 heavyweight was enough of a challenge. The 2nd match this year to go the distance; it had some of the same elements that the first decision had. The kid would attempt takedowns against Cpher but Cpher would get the points for them; kid would escape and the process would slowly repeat itself. In the end, a 9-6 win for Cpher.

Match 4: Waverly. A different kind of challenge here - this kid was smaller (but still a decent size heavyweight) and quick. And he wanted more than anything than to get Cpher into a bear hug and try and toss him to the mat. He succeeded in this very early and went up 2-0. And then Cpher escaped, the kid tried again and Cpher was ready for it and it didn’t work and Cpher almost got the pin out of it. They reset, kid tried again, didn’t work, and Cpher almost got the pin out of it and by the end of the 1st period it’s 10-7 Cpher. I’ve never seen a Cpher match with that many points.

By the middle of the 2nd period it was 14-8 and Cpher got the kid on the ground again and finally pinned him. Cpher’s 4-0, maybe he can go undefeated today!

Match 5: Charlotte. By all reasonable measure Cpher should have / could have won this. This kid lost to the Mason and Waverly heavyweights. And Cpher was winning 4-0 late in the first period and I’m not sure what happened. The kid took Cpher down; Cpher tripped, and he was trying to get away from being pinned (and he looked to be escaping) when the ref said he got pinned. Cpher later says he was pissed off about it, he didn’t think he was pinned. I think he should have just tried to roll off of his back instead of trying to ‘back’ away from the kid on his back…..I’m not sure you can do what he was trying to do without getting both of your shoulders on the match at the same time.

Oh well. 4-1 (and if there had been individual flight winners he would have won 1st place) is a pretty good Saturday

Cpher Wrestling - Holt

I haven’t been writing about these Wednesday meets because, well, since I’ve restarted blogging every Wednesday meet has been the same. Cpher wins by forfeit. This Wednesday actually featured a real life opponent.

The match went like the majority of Cpher’s wins have gone - Cpher overwhelms his opponent and pins him quickly. A few things of note here:

1) Cpher is now 9-2 in January. It’s been quite a change since the 5-7 start to the year. A lot of this is that the “opponent win by stupid Cpher move” hasn’t been seen for a while.

2) With the win Cpher is in a great position to finish 5-1 and in 2nd place in the league. He, um, failed to compete, against the kid who will finish in 1st and if he doesn’t regret that choice I do - it would have been nice to know if he can beat that kid (and he was competitive for 90 seconds before getting taken down and not really trying to avoid getting pinned).

3) The Cpher-style of wrestling is different than almost everybody else I see out there. He goes straight ahead and attacks and attacks and attacks. There is no ‘tactical’ pause - and I think he might want to consider how to ‘retreat’ from bad positions and start over against some opponents. Next Wednesday will be interesting - the heavyweight from East Lasning, from what I have seen, likes to take his time and tie up his opponents and wait for his spots. My prediction is that Cpher overpowers him….but I’ve been known to be wrong on this kind of thing.

USS Enterprise

Things that make me happy - getting this

The company has offered a subsciption to get smaller models (I think they are up to 90(!) now) but even though they look cool I’m not sure I want to get into collection 90 some ships at $20 something a pop. But very recently they started to offer XL size ships. So this Enterprise is almost a foot long.

Ok, maybe a touch more than 12” long with my engineers scale there. Looks pretty cool - they offer about 10 XL ships now and I’m not sure I want all of them BUT I do think I want 6-8 of them. Because that’s the geek I am.

Detroit

Work had me down in Detroit on Friday for a meeting about a decommisioned industrial site - the owner is trying to figure out the best way to finally ‘close’ the site and maximize the return during divestment. It is a very nice location - there are a lot of possibilities.

A view from the parking garage

Dawn. That’s Belle Isle in the middle of the Detroit River - we need to get over there sometime this summer; it’s one of the things we haven’t done in Michigan yet.

In the elevator of the Ren Center as we headed down to go to our meeting.

The site we were talking about - it’s been used as the scene for some films recently since it was decommisioned in 2008. Like this one for example.

Cpher Wrestling - Ithaca

The latest Saturday adventure takes up north to Ithaca. This is a straight-forward double-elimination tournament.

Match 1: For the first time this year Cpher faces an opponent who he has wrestled before, Ithaca’s #2 heavyweight. This kid is smaller, and can wrestle well, and pinned Cpher in 4 1/2 minutes the first time and sadly, pins him in 90 seconds this time. I wish I had a good explanation for why he struggles so much against smaller and faster opponents. Inexperience? Not coached to handle this (and my opinion on the coaching is ‘meh’. It just seems like the coaches are ‘there’ - I never hear them coaching during the match. So, to the consolation bracket he goes.

Match 2: Up against Ithaca’s #3 heavyweight (that’s such an advantage for them to have kids who can wrestle against each other in practice). Cpher dominates this kid and wins in about 40 seconds

Match 3: The opponent is from Onaway (this meet was an introduction to a whole lot of smaller Michigan schools I have never heard of). Cpher wins by pin after 90 seconds; he tossed the kid to the ground so violently at one point there was a noticeable ‘whoa’ from the crowd.

Match 4: For 5th place he faces a kid from Marlette. Cpher reports the kid was bleeding pretty good after the match; Cpher won by pin in 2 min and 30 seconds.

It’s been a nice change from December - Cpher went 1-2 in both of those Saturday tournaments and now in January he has gone 3-1 in the last two tournaments. Has a league meet on Wednesday where I think he will finally get to wrestle and probably is favored to win against Holt.

Matthew - Legacy Showcase

Matthew was scheduled to play an indoor game (at Legacy) Saturday night but Friday brought some interesting emails - could the team switch schedules to an earlier time slot to play in a college showcase game. 30 minutes against two teams, 30 minutes off between games. Hate this late notice (I’m the manager this year to try and avoid some of the admin problems the team has been having - which would frustrate the hell out of me if I wasn’t kind of in charge) but ask everyone and it seems we can make it. Turns out the organizers did have 8-10 college coaches in attendance.

Match 1 - We play MAFC 02 - when Chill fell apart last year there were four ‘great’ 02s on that team. Three, including Matthew, play on the Rush team but one has chosen to drive down to Brighton to play with MAFC and has made some (maybe joking?) comments that he didn’t play with Rush because they/we were a ‘bad team’.

So it is really cool that we just obliterate the MAFC team. It’s 4-0 and the ref gives them a verrrry soft PK to make the final 4-1. Boys are really happy about the result, parents are happy, it’s a good thing. Against MRL competition (the ‘higher’ league that is ‘supposedly’ better than us) we are 4-0 this year when our full team plays.

Match 2 - we’re matched up against the Fire 00’s; they are two years older. And they come out and are bigger, faster, more physical, and we are down 2-0 quickly. We rally to play the rest of the game even but it was a disappointing outing. In the end…pretty easy to forget when you think back about how the day began with that win…yeah, who cares about this game.

Cpher - Dansville Wrestling

The first part of a long Saturday was heading out to watch Cpher wrestle in Dansville. This was, supposedly, an individual tournament. Not sure I understand that….they awarded team trophies at the end. But, schools could have more than one kid wrestle in each weight class.

There are 8 heavyweights - they are divided into 2 pools and they will wrestle the other 3 opponents and then have one final crossover match against the other pool; 1st -vs- 1st, 2nd -vs- 2nd.

Match 1: Goes up against the 2nd heavyweight from East Lansing. Cpher will face the varsity heavy in a week or two but just dominated this guy to end up winning by pin in the 2nd period. Tossed him around for all of the 1st period but couldn’t pin him - they had to stop the match because the kid has a bloody nose. In the 2nd period the kid got to his feet from the mat and Cpher just ‘helicoptered’ him back to the ground and he hit head and knees first and just stays down. Another injury delay. Kid does keep going and 10 seconds after that Cpher pins him.

Match 2: The opponent is from East Jackson - they walk out and I turn to another parent and go “this should be over quick”. The kid is a) a lot shorter and b) out of shape - pudgy is the key word here. And sure enough, 9 seconds after the match starts it is over. Shortest match of the year!

Match 3: Win this match and he wins the pool. But the opponent is Cpher’s kryptonite - a smaller (220 lb) faster kid who can wrestle. Cpher needs to learn that against this type of opponent he needs to slow the match down and take every opportunity to use his weight and size advantage against the kid by being on top of him and not losing control of him. His opponent, on the other hand, wants to go fast and create separation and tire Cpher out. And the match was fast moving and Cpher got pinned in about a minute.

Match 4: So it is a 2nd -vs- 2nd match up. And this match becomes Cpher’s longest match of the year - the first time there is no pin. It’s a strange but repetitive match. The kid from Grass Lake could get into Cpher’s legs and begin to take him down but it took a lot of effort and by the time he got Cpher down it turned out Cpher would be on top and get 2 points. The kid would escape and get a point and the process would begin again. Cpher won 16-8 and said he realized ealry on he wasn’t going to be able to pin this guy and just settled in and kept earning the points for the win.

Turns out the team took 2nd (out of 8 teams) and got a trophy. Cpher says he finished in a 3-way tie for first and will get a medal but I think either he or the person telling him this was confused; he finished in a tie for 2nd at 3-1. So he should get a medal in the mail.

Upcoming: There is a team meet on Wednesday but it looks like Cpher won’t wrestle; Everett doesn’t have a heavyweight. Then another tournament of some sort in Ithaca on Saturday

Matthew Soccer - Fort Wayne

The team played in a college showcase in Fort Wayne last weekend. I would have preferred we never went to the event - the games came after we hadnt practiced for 2 weeks and that certainly wasn’t optimal. Turns out the field wasn’t full-sized (it was full width but not full length) and the games were about 25 minute halfs (not 40). Just a waste of time in some ways - I refuse to believe there is a college coach out there who is watching any of the U16 or U17 teams playing there.

Game 1 - we won 3-1. We looked sloppy doing it but slowly just overpowered this team from Cleveland.

Game 2 - we lost 4-2. We were down 4-0 at the half; I’ve never seen this team play so poorly. I’ve never seen Matthew play so poorly - he was awful, worse than bad, and three of those goals were him missing a tackle and letting a guy have a wide open shot on goal. Ugly. I was dreading the ride home (we commuted instead of staying the night) but thankfully Matthew was in full agreement about how bad he played.

Game 3 won 4-1. We overpowered this team from Cincinnati - we were in full let’s experiment mode in the seond half. I had asked the coach if he was going to use these games to see people in different positions - pointed out to him that Matthew and Austin have played a ton of time in the midfield and he hasn’t seen that. So Matthew plays in the midfield most of this game - had a few chances to score but didn’t convert. Thought he played about 1000% better than Saturday night so that was a good thing.

Cpher Wrestling - Early January

The first Saturday tournament of January is in the books. Cpher goes 3-2; 1 win, 2 wins by forfeit, 2 losses. This continues a trend in every tournament so far - a 1-2 record in actual matches wrestled. I wasn’t there - Suzanne got the all-day wrestling duty this weekend - but here’s what I saw on the video.

1) Wins by pin in 1:29. Man, if there is a typical Cpher win it is this match….a whole lot of big guys jockeying for position for a 80 seconds, a Cpher throw to the ground and a pin 9 seconds later.

2) Loses by pin in 1:04. And a classic example of Cpher actually going up against someone who knows how to wrestle - the kid tied up Cpher’s arms for the entire match. What is becoming a trend (and not a positive one) is Cpher trying ‘something’ (possibly because he is impatient? need to ask him about this) and about 5 seconds after he tried that ‘something’ and failed he was pinned.

3) Loses by pin at 4:50. One of the longest matches Cpher has wrestled this year and he says he was losing 4-3 when it ended. Looked to me like he might have had the kid in a very good spot (for cpher) early in the 1st period but they ended up out of bounds and had to reset. The pin was sudden and weird; Cpher tried to throw him to the ground, didn’t do it, tripped, fell, and ended up on the bottom. The end.

He will win by forfeit on Wednesday to bring his record, with forfeits, to .500 at 7-7. I’ll spend a long day at a gym in Dansville with him on Saturday.

Club Soccer - Season To Date

Matthew’s soccer team hits the indoor fields again this weekend for 3 games in a “College Showcase”. This is code words for a tournament that may have some low level college coaches who will spend no time looking at your kid. But whatever.

This post will take some time since I need (or want) to explain where Matthew is at right now.

Chill: We’ve moved on from our club soccer home for the last 4(?) years. How hard is it to run a soccer club and pay your coaches on time? Apparently, it’s a very hard task - we’ve now left two clubs because of it.

So, the choice came down to driving 45 minutes plus (each way) for practice and games or stay closer to home and be on a very good Rush Lansing team that, convienently, needed a center back. And we were going to go tryout out for the other club, but, it turned out the first tryout was on the first day of finals and I just couldn’t stomach Matthew being in the car for 90 minutes when he really need to study. So that was that.

The Rush Lansing team MIGHT be the best team that Matthew has ever been on - there’s a whole birth year switch that happened that I’m not going to get into here - but the team has 4 or 5 kids who can score, a decent goalie, and now with the 3 kids that came over from Chill, a solid defense and an improved midfield. And the results to date show that. Went to Indianapolis in November and went 2-0-1 against some very high-level teams.

So, optimism is high for the coming season. The ‘drama’ on the team is a little hard to deal with - maybe I’ll go into that more later.

The long-lost Santa

Of all the different Christmas ornaments and items that would come out each Christmas when I was a kid, there was only one that I still remember - the Santa with the nose that you push and he sings. “Welcome one, welcome all, Santa Claus (pause) is (pause) here!"

The Santa we had was destroyed in a drunken fit of rage when a) I was in high school and b) not at the house. But with the arrival of the internet and, even better, the arrival of internet auction shopping, I’ve been looking around for the Santa. But it’s been a mostly fruitless search - what do you type in as seach terms to get the thing to show up? Singing Santa push nose?

But this year, while in Nashville for Thanksgiving, I tried again and this time, and I’m not sure that I’ve done this before, I just searched images. And lo-and-behold, about 3/4 of the way down the screen, there it was.

Finding it was one thing - finding one that I could buy was another! But just finding it was useful - the one I found had a picture of the box and so I learned a better search was “Santa Door Decoration” and the word ‘vintage’ might help to cut down on the false returns. So I went back out, searched the internet, ebay, nothing. And then one of the search returns had the word ‘etsy’ and I figured I might as well try that

And there it was! But…..it didn’t work - the listing says even with a new battery it wouldn’t work. I figured what the hell, get it and see if it was a simple fix I could figure out or worst-case I had to find someone to repair it. Turns out I couldn’t fix it - but, taking it to a local shop they were able to fix it (a short-term fix, they said they needed to order a new motor for a more permanent fix).

It was really cool to hear it again - and see it work the 5 or 6 times we were able to get it to play at home before it died again. I didn’t realize the Santa would dredge up some very bad memories for my sister of our Dad - but, I think anything from our past runs the risk of that.

Wrestling - Season To Date

So Cpher has returned to wrestling since his time in 8th grade. He was convinced/cajoled into this - I’m kind of surprised (but happy) that we ended up here.

1) His friend Sean has been working on and trying to get Cpher to return to wrestling since 8th grade.
2) I think, sadly, his lacrosse days are over. More on this later as we move into spring. But since he might not be doing that Mom and Dad have strongly suggested he continue to do a sport (or two) to help with fitness and weight control.

Cpher is 3-5 so far this season. His wins, for the most part, happen because he can bring his size and strength into play and the other kid, who is invariably smaller and lighter, can’t handle it. His losses are almost all the same - he runs up against someone who is a better ‘wrestler’ and he gets Cpher into a bad position and Cpher can’t escape and gets pinned.

The last ‘meet’, two matches on a Wednesday night, are probably worth describing as a good summary of where we are at. Cpher thought he’d lose both of these league matches and turned out going 1-1. I’m ecstatic that he got the win but disappointed in how the loss came about.

The first match, the win, was the first time I’ve seen Cpher get out of bad spots. He was down 4-0 in the match; the kid from Jackson had taken him down twice and usually once Cpher is down with the kid above him it’s a very bad thing. But he battled and got to the edge of the mat twice and that got him back to a ‘neutral’ position (although still ‘down’ - better than a position where he could immediately get pinned) and then eventually escaped (earning a point, losing 4-1 now). And then he got the kid in a hold, took him down to the mat and 20 seconds later Cpher wins.

The second match was against the guy he is going to have to beat at some point this year to have any ‘success’ this season (in league, in districts, etc.). And for about a minute Cpher was having quite a battle with him - the kid can’t get Cpher down and Cpher can’t get him down either. Finally the kid does get Cpher on the mat and the pin happens quickly after that. I’m disappointed that Cpher, to me, didn’t try harder to escape - it was pretty clear that Cpher was happy enough just winning once on the evening and he even admits he didn’t try very hard (like he did in the first match) to escape.

Brooklyn

Last weekend was Mom and Dad driving Kevin out to New York for his last internship, a tour with the Criminal Division of the US Attorney’s Office for Southern New York. And the major themes and pictures are out on Facebook. But here are some random comments that didn’t make it there.

1) Man it was cold. But the wind was the killer - I think we could have gotten through just fine because we are Michigan-acclimitized without the wind. But the wind made hats an utter necessity, and it turns out that Suzanne hated the look of my hat. And I think my hat was the most functional of the bunch. It’s this cap-scarf combo that I guess could go under a ski-helmet. Suzanne hated that it looke goofy on my head; I loved it because it covered my ears and my neck and I bet I was the warmest on New Year’s Eve when we were standing on the Brooklyn Bridge.

2) I’m glad I have Suzanne to ‘force’ me and the family to have all of these experiences because there are things we did this trip (the Bridge on NYE) that we probably wouldn’t have done if she didn’t have us doing it.

3) But the one thing I realized I disliked the most was the walk through Times Square - the older I get the less thrilled I am to be out battling through these situations.

4) Highlights? Loved the trip to Bryant Park.

(NBC News had this frozen fountain as a shot on the news last night)

Was really glad we went by the window display at Macy's

5) Lowlights? The roads were not optimal BUT we did avoid any major snowstorms so I shouldn’t complain. The van changed color from maroon to this ugly salt-crusted brown by the end of the trip. And as a family, we need to be better about moments when we end up ‘off-book’.

6) We saw movies since it was so cold. Loved the Alamo Drafthouse - what a great place to see a movie. Enjoyed Molly’s Game - can’t believe I didn’t fall asleep during it! I Tonya was good but the music really made it great. And The Post was good but not great - for me it was the worst of the three movies we saw in NYC - but the memory of the movie was Kevin nudging me with the enthusiasm of a twelve-year old and telling me to look at Mom, whose head is tilted back, mouth slightly open and she is G-O-N-E sleeping!

Personality Test

Maybe I’ll get Kevin’s or Suzanne’s here too….we’ll see

http://www.personalitylab.org/tests/bfi2_self_pol.htm

Score (0-100)

Personality Dimension

77

Extraversion

High scorers tend to be talkative and energetic. They like being around people, and are comfortable asserting themselves in a group. High scorers tend to have more friends and dating partners, and are seen as more popular. They generally prefer, and are successful in, social and enterprising occupations. They are more likely to serve in community leadership roles, and to do volunteer work. They tend to prefer energetic music such as hip-hop, rock, and heavy metal, exercise more frequently, and are more likely to play a sport. They experience more frequent positive emotions, and react more strongly to positive events. Women tend to score higher than men.

Low scorers tend to be socially and emotionally reserved. They generally prefer to be alone or with a few close friends, and keep their opinions and feelings to themselves. Low scorers tend to pursue, and do better in, jobs that involve independent work rather than social interaction. They are less likely to engage in thrill-seeking or risky behaviors, such as smoking, alcohol consumption, and risky sexual activity.

69

Agreeableness

High scorers tend to be considerate and polite in social interactions, and enjoy cooperating. They find it easy to trust people, and feel compassion for those in need. High scorers tend to be well liked by their peers, and establish satisfying and stable close relationships. They generally prefer, and do better in, social occupations. They are more likely to be religious, to serve in community leadership roles, and to do volunteer work. They tend to prefer pop, country, and religious music. Women tend to score higher than men, and older adults tend to score higher than younger adults.

Low scorers express themselves directly and bluntly, even at the risk of starting an argument. They enjoy competition, and tend to be skeptical of other people's intentions. Low scorers tend to earn higher salaries, and are more likely to engage in some risky behaviors, such as smoking and aggressive driving.

46

Conscientiousness

High scorers tend to be organized and responsible. They work hard to achieve their goals, and see tasks through to completion. High scorers tend to earn higher grades in school, and perform better in many occupations. They are more likely to be religious and hold conservative political attitudes. They tend to exercise more, have better physical health, and live longer. Women tend to score higher than men, and older adults tend to score higher than younger adults.

Low scorers tend to act spontaneously rather than making plans, and find it easier to look at the big picture than pay attention to details. They prefer to jump between tasks, instead of finishing one at a time. Low scorers are more likely to hold liberal political attitudes. They tend to engage in more risky behaviors, such as smoking, alcohol consumption, drug use, and risky sexual activity.

17

Neuroticism

High scorers tend to be emotionally sensitive, and have up-and-down mood swings. They experience more frequent negative emotions, and react more strongly to negative events. Women tend to score higher than men, and younger adults tend to score higher than older adults.

Low scorers tend to be emotionally stable and resilient. They usually stay calm, even in stressful situations, and can quickly bounce back from negative events. Low scorers tend to feel a greater sense of well-being.

69

Openness to Experience

High scorers are generally open to new activities and new ideas. They tend to be creative, intellectually curious, and sensitive to art and beauty. High scorers tend to prefer, and do better in, scientific and artistic occupations. They are more likely to hold liberal political attitudes, prefer classical, jazz, blues, and rock music, and engage in drug use.

Low scorers tend to be traditional, down-to-earth, and stick with tried-and-true ways of doing things. They prefer the familiar over the new, and the concrete over the abstract. Low scorers tend to prefer, and do better in, conventional and practical occupations. They are more likely to hold conservative political attitudes.

I’ll blog this!

I knew this was going here the moment I saw it and started to read it in Boston before having it roughly (and rudely!) snatched from my hands. But the primary motivation to return to blogging is Kevin, so, he can’t bitch much when I use his content to continue to add to the family’s institutional history. Glad he left it where I could find it (again!) and put it here.

What to blog?

It’s a harder question that you might think. With facebook being the primary place to share photos I’ve had to really think about what to post here. The same pictures? Not sure that makes much sense, especially since we can purchase books (for about $40) of each year of facebook.

So maybe try and discuss things and concepts that won’t end up on Facebook? We’ll see.

Random Stuff:

The newest card game to hit the house is Wizards, a combination of spades and hearts and a pretty good introduction to bidding and trump for the boys. Christopher, at first, refused to play and couldn’t understand why we would play a game that came from Trump, and we had to slow down and point out that trump is a card term not a mental lunatic of a President.

So, it’s fun - we’ve played four times so far, I’ve won twice (hah!) but all of the games have been pretty competitive. The games went better once Cpher figured out the concept that you had to follow suit in accordance with the rules(!)

Wiley gets all the ‘text’ around here, but I would have to reluctantly admit that the ‘most loving’ of our three dogs is Holly and she would easily get the crown of ‘best’ dog if she just wouldn’t bark at anything and everything she sees outside that she perceives as a threat to the house (that’s everything she sees…)

We bought antler head gear and other santa stuff for the dogs - the only one who would even remotely let that stuff stay on her head for more than a few minutes is Holly.

American Literature

I don't think I've ever had a kid hate a class, no, hate a teacher, as much as Christopher is hating American Literature. Before parent/teacher conferences I asked him if there was anything he wanted to tell me, he said "Tell Dockus she assigns way too much homework!". I did; she wasn't very amused by this.

And he's right, she does assign a shit-ton of writing assignments. Fortunately for me, and this blog, she assigned a 'blog' that Cpher has had to write. So I'm going to capture those posts here (if there are more than one)

Football Experiences and Memories

In every sport you can make memories and have good experiences. Football is no exception. Since football is a team sport, the player has to work with their teammates to achieve a goal. With this in mind, the player has to become close with other players, thus making memories and having good experiences.

The people you play football with makes a huge impact on the result of the game. If you play with serious athletes that only care about winning, it won’t be as fun. And if you play with people who only care about having fun, odds are you won’t win. Having a team that is equally balanced is superb, and that was how my team was this year. Ever since I started playing football, I didn’t get along with a lot of teammates. I didn’t like the “popular” people and most of the “popular” people played football. I always thought that my teammates were jerks, but this past few years have been different. Especially in the last season, I became friends with players I’ve never talked to before. One of my favorite parts of practice was goofing off and talking to my lineman friends. Since football is usually broken into different positions, you and the other players that play the same position become close. I’m friends with all the lineman on the team and the bond we create is truly special. One of my favorite experiences with them was at the team dinners, or waiting to start practice in the locker room. We would always joke and there would always be a fun, cheerful vibe.

The experience of my first varsity season is unforgettable. From having an amazing coach, to having a winning season, everything was amazing. Ever since the first day of freshman year, my grade knew that the year that Okemos did good in football, would be the year when we were juniors. With our grade and the grade above us, we have a strong line, and skilled players to run and pass the ball. The seniors were nice and helped the juniors through our first varsity game. They gave us tips and advice on what to do, and that was very unusual. For previous years, the senior and juniors didn’t get along with each other. I always heard that the team felt separated, but this year we came together as one, whole team.

Even though the season wasn’t the greatest, it was still very good. Okemos hasn’t had a winning season since 2014. It was nice to know that I was part of a team that was making history. We won our first four games in a row. That hasn’t happened since 1998. We lost four times in the season. Two of the loses, we should have won, but knowing that we were in the game until the very last seconds, made it feel better. Even after the losses, the team still came together and it was very moving. To see a team slowly separating, and then coming back together to finish with a winning season was very meaningful. Overall, I have enjoyed playing football, making the memories with great people, and having an unforgettable experience. Have you made any good memoirs from playing a sport? If so, let me know!