So the wait continues to see if I get a job......
No word from the clinic. I'd imagine it wouldn't be til the middle of this week, but damn I wanna know now. Make me feel a lot better to know that I can quit searching the same websites daily for the same jobs. It sucks valuing where you want to live over what you want to do....really hamstrings you sometimes.
Today marks Valentine's Day #2 with Rachel. Great year, had its ups and downs. Last year I took her roses at work. This year I'm broke, so I have to scale back my gift. I'm scaling it back so much, I haven't got it yet, or figured out what it's going to be. No bother, I've still got 5 hours til she gets home. Well.....4 hours and 49 minutes, but who's counting? Thanks to everyone who offered their advice on what I should get her.
As kind of a pre-valentine's day date, we went to the Oregon Food and Wine Festival in Salem on Saturday. Good times, although I have a little bone to pick with the people who put on this event. Why do you allow people to sample the wines for fifty cents, but you have to buy a full meal to sample the food? I guess I did get to eat some pretzel sticks with various dipping sauces for free, but where was the bite of a hot dog on a stick? Or the philly cheese steak wrap cut up with a toothpick thru it? As a result I had to decide what I was hungriest for and sample that and that only. Thus I ended up with beef brisket sandwich. Rachel opted for the bourbon chicken sandwich. She picked right, I picked wrong. Being a guy, I felt I had to pick the red meat selection. Note to self: you don't always have to be a guy. That bourbon chicken sandwich was awesome. no way was i going to pay another $5 to get one though.
Another great thing about it was the Salem-Keizer Volcanoes baseball team had a booth there. I was offered a job to work for the Volcanoes, and I have an idea that if I'd have taken it, I'd be sitting at this table rather than the extremely bored looking girl in a mustard yellow shirt that was there. No regrets on my part. I found it amusing that their tickets were $8 a game, while the Portland Beavers have tickets for $6. Does this make sense? Single-A short season ball (also known as the first rung on the ladder) for $8 or AAA (also known as the last step before the bigs) for $6? Anyways, they had one of those "fastest pitch" things set up, where you can throw three balls for $1 and they'll record the speed of your fastest throw. The sign said "fastest pitch of the day wins a prize." So I asked what the prize was. She says "a weekend vacation." Not too shabby. I asked where this trip was to, and she tells me that they have "a variety of locations across the country." I looked at the sign, and the fastest pitch was 53 MPH. Not to toot my own horn, but I think I could throw that off-handed. So I ponied up the buck, and threw a pitch. 61 MPH. Already in the lead. Next pitch was 64 and the last one was 65. So I'm in the lead, and feeling pretty good, since a vast majority of the people at this festival are 50 years or older and more interested in filling their glasses with merlot or pinot than throwing baseballs. We walk away to taste some more wines (rachel) and contemplate buying more food (me).
Out of the corner of my ear, I hear a faint "pop." Someone else was throwing baseballs. Sounded like they were throwing them pretty good too. I had to go check it out. Some guy, probably just old enough to get into a wine festival, is pitching. Much to my chagrin, he's just thrown a ball 67 MPH. Bye bye weekend vacation. Rachel goes "you can throw harder than that." She's right! So I wait til he wanders off, not to give away my intentions. Then I forked over another dollar. Wound up and threw.....66. Dang. Gonna have to dig a little deeper. Next pitch...69. Yeah boy! That vacation is mine. The last one I was feeling pretty good and more than a little cocky. So I fire it in there.......
Before I tell you the speed, let me say something. When you haven't pitched in almost 4 years, and haven't even softly tossed a baseball in over a year, it's a very bad idea to go out and throw a ball as hard as you can without warming up. I was able to get away with this for 5 pitches, but the sixth one just killed. I got that tingly sore sensation you get when you throw a ball a little too hard almost instantly. Two days later, I can still tell that I probably threw that last one with a little too much gusto. I hit 71 and felt pretty safe that the kid wasn't going to be able to top that. I figured he had to throw about his best to beat 65, because nobody's gonna hold back and try and throw just 2 MPH faster than the previous best. There's no way you could trust yourself to throw a ball just that much faster...you'd have to pick it up a little bit just to feel safe.
Sadly though, I still have not received a phone call congratulating me on winning a weekend vacation. Maybe someone beat me after we left. Maybe the Volcanoes brought in a ringer right at the end of the day to ensure that their tiny organization that pays people barely better than minimum wage would not have to dole out a vacation. Maybe they conveniently wrote down my number incorrectly. Maybe they'll still call. I doubt it.
Other highlights of the weekend:
*Quote of the weekend - "I'd love to ride a horse through an office building." Grant, while watching Open Range.
*Surprise of the weekend - Oregon State beating Washington by 17. Big big win for our little university. It's the kind of win that makes you think ridiculous thoughts. Thoughts like "if we win our last six games (including 4 on the road, where we're 4-8 on the season), we might make the NCAA tournament!" or...."This win might give us the momentum to win at Arizona (where we haven't won in god knows how long)." Yes, I've thought both of these thoughts over the past 24 hours.
*Gift of the weekend - Rach got me a six pack of Pepsi and a book called "100 Greatest Sports Arguments of all time" for V-Day. This is why I love her. Two of my favorite things: Drinking Pepsi and arguing about sports. Probably cost her about $10 total, yet she couldn't have picked a more perfect gift.
*Disappointment of the weekend - Finding out that I could only throw a ball 71 MPH. My how the years fly by. My how the years sap your athletic ability.
*Moment of the Weekend - Rachel and I dancing in our living room to DJ Casper's "Cha Cha Slide." One of the most ridiculous songs of all time, and also one of the best songs to dance to of all time. In fact, it was so fun, we did it again the next night. Yes we're dorks. But this is reason #1,456 why I love her.
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