My OFFICIAL Soccer / Band Mom Debut!

Today is Tito's first REAL soccer game. Two twenty-minute halves, on a full-sized field. Each player is required to play a minimum of ten minutes, total. He is SO EXCITED.

He played 3-on-3 indoor soccer before, as you may remember, which was a complete joke. It was soccer in the sense that there was a soccer ball, and kids instinctively kicked it.

Most of the kids needed to be reminded that you're not supposed to pick up the ball with their hands unless you're the goalie. And since it was 3-on-3 indoor, you didn't have a goalie. Tito was a rock-star compared to the kids who had no clue which way they were supposed to be going.

I think this soccer program is infinitely better-suited for Tito. This coach isn't a total pussy. He's from New Zealand and he has a sexy accent. He says "training" instead of "practice". I love it. He emphasizes skills beyond the basics and teaches the kids how an actual game works.

Tito has a game tomorrow too, since the game got rained out last weekend. I have the Field Status/ Rainout Hotline number in my cell phone now.

Yesterday I misplaced the paper with the game schedule on it and about had a heart attack.

R and I are running a split squad today, as Tito's game is at 11 and I have to take Beebie to her Ensemble Band Competition at 12:45. I'm picking up Buffy and Princeton too.

Oh, and that reminds me - Buffy loves me because Wednesday afternoon she had to take Perfect Baby to the hospital with Rotavirus to get some fluids. She called me while I was at lunch with Speed, and we worked it out so Princeton went home with Beeb after school and I picked up dinner for everyone and took Princeton to the hospital. Buffy was so grateful. I love that feeling. She needs me. It's cool.

Last night, after Tito's "training", I met R and Pie at Beebie's recital/ practice before her competition. Beeb's performance - a flute duet - was early in the program, and she was wonderful.

Later in the program, however, came Princeton's ensemble performance. Princeton's a percussionist. And his ensemble included ...

A COWBELL.



Do you have moments with your Best Friend where some reference to something you both think is funny pops up at a totally unexpected time, and you know you're both thinking the same thing and if you look at each other you're just going to piss yourselves laughing? This used to happen to my sister and me in church ALL the time, when we were kids.

Cowbell, to me, is inherently hilarious, ever since Will Ferrell and Christopher Walken's classic SNL bit - Blue Oyster Cult: Behind The Music. You know the one I'm talking about, don't you?

Anyway, with the band kid wailing on the Cowbell, I knew I'd get a fit of the Horribly Inappropriate Giggles if I made eye contact with R, so instead I took my phone out of my pocket to send a text to R, who was sitting two seats down, telling him not to look at me.

I saw that I had an unread text message. If there was a way to see who it was from without actually reading it, I wouldn't have opened the message. But I had to.

It was a single word.




COWBELL.