Being Old and Young at the Same Time

Finally, I found more people to play tennis with, more people to help me conserve my energy so that I don't have to go one on one with my French tennis buddy (who I swear is part Tasmanian devil. On speed.). Singles equals my chest nearly exploding every 15 minutes as I try to run down every ball and cover the whole side of the court. Doubles equals more hitting, less lateral running, less chances to twist my ankles. I think one friend called me the laziest tennis player ever.

My Tasmanian Devil friend and I, we like to run and just hit the ball as hard as we can, getting all that pent up crazy energy out on the courts. (Except for me, maybe half the energy exertion). So when our two new tennis buddies asked if we wanted to play an actual game Thursday night, we just looked at them as if they were speaking Martian, then turned to each other and said the same thing.

"Not really. We just to like run around and hit the ball."

Screw rules and regulations. Screw waiting around for serves, love this, deuce that. This is pure kid rules. Where there's no rules except you try to hit the ball back no matter how many bounces there are or how far it lands outside the lines. Lines? What lines?

By the time we tired out our new friends enough for them to call it quits, I was all boundless happiness.

"I feel great! I usually want to die after 15 minutes of playing Tasmanian Devil! But right now, I'm not tired at all!!!"

Until I got home. And every muscle, fiber, tendon, skin and bone ached from the inside out. For two days. It hurt to move. Darn it. Guess I'm not a kid after all.

Firsts' of the Year

Last night, I went to my first concert of the year and it was a good one. After some good ole chicken pot pie from Marie Callendar's to warm us up, SLY and I hit the Troubadour again to see Rhett Miller. I'd never heard his music but boy was I pleasantly surprised.

The pretty boy can sing. And he has the charm of Elvis with his hip swinging, knee shaking, circular guitar strumming nonstop energy. He played for 2 hours and came back for three encores. My favorites included "Four Eyed Girl" and his band Old 97's song “Rollerskate Skinny,” where he sings “I believe in love, but it don't believe in me.” I'm definitely a fan now and plan to attend more of his shows! I loved every song and couldn't stop smiling!

Here's SLY's favorite.


His opening band Western States Motel, wasn't bad either. Plus they had the charm of looking like engineers as their day jobs.

Today, I finally dragged my slow, lazy self to the courts to play tennis with my old tennis buddy from work. That was not pretty. I haven't run or really exerted myself since early December and it shows. Though the cold air didn't help, my chest was screaming in pain after running around the court and missing several shots. Apparently getting a new racket doesn't miraculously improve your game. Or enable you to hustle after the ball faster.

On a better note, I did finish reading my first book of the year. A librarian friend introduced me to graphic novels. Not the comic book superhero anime type stuff, but well crafted stories using artwork to convey some of the emotions or serious subjects, like war, loneliness, family, dual cultures... I highly recommend both "Persepolis 2" and "Goodbye Chunky Rice."

Well, it's mid January already so we'll how much more will be accomplished by the end of the month...

You Gotta Fight, For Your Right...

to a tennis court!

After another rough work day, I texted my brother in the evening. "Wanna play tennis? I want to hit something tonight." And amazingly enough, he called me immediately and said yes.

We tried another set of public courts to see if the poaching situation would be any better. Unfortunately, it was only marginally better. We still waited a good half hour and this time decided to stand in the middle of two courts to claim whichever one opened up first.

A little while later, another girl and boy walked in, looked at us, and said "which court are you waiting for?"
"Whichever one opens up first. We've been waiting here for half an hour." I warily answered.
"Well, I thought you're supposed to wait for one court only. Can you choose one so that we can wait for the other one?" the girl asked.
Before I could say "Back off, beeyotch," my brother wisely answered "It seems like everyone else is waiting by sections, since the courts are sectioned off by two."
"Well, what if I don't feel like being everyone else?" the girl whined/mumbled to her friend.

We looked away and replied with silence, leaving her to her useless petulance. They backed off and my brother and I grinned at each other at our 2nd official weekly victory of claiming a tennis court.

"You know..." he said, "If we couldn't play, I would have just as much fun making it miserable and ruining everyone else's game by throwing balls at them or stealing them. If I can't play, no one can."

And this, this is why I love being around my brother.

We played till I could barely lift my arm anymore. It was great!

Oh Brother

One of my brother's favorite things to do when he calls me at work is to yell "YOU'RE FIRED!!! LEAVE THE OFFICE IMMEDIATELY!" Then he starts cracking up at how funny he is while I sit there in silence, knowing that it's him. Seeing that it's been a year since he's left LA for school and not working or living near me anymore, I forgot how much I miss those little stupid things when he's back and up to his old tricks.

I was lucky enough to be his default plan tonight since he had to work late at his summer internship and miss his bschool function. After ten years of not picking up a racket, he decided to try tennis again this week. He was so confident he could beat me after playing for the first time on Sunday, we decided to head for the courts tonight. I am by no means a natural athlete, but tennis I can do.

The courts were crowded as usual and several others eyed us warily as we all waited for the first court to open up. Tennis court etiquette is a bit odd. Some people believe that you should take your best guess and choose a court that you think will free up first. Then you wait. But for just THAT court. Others (people who are nice and believe in fairness) think the person waiting the longest should get the first court that opens up. First come, first serve. My usual tennis buddy has gotten in shouting matches with people who either wouldn't leave after playing for more than an hour or those who try to poach our courts.

Tonight, after we had waited half an hour, a group of Chinese girls tried to poach our court after showing up just 2 minutes before the first court opened up. They claimed I could only wait for one court and that I was standing closer to the other ones. I would have stood my ground, but I didn't have to. My tall, imposing, stubborn as all hell of a brother walked over to the people leaving and to those girls, declaring that the court was ours. We were there first.

He turned to me and said "I'm not worried about this. The court is ours. I will sit on the floor of this court and throw tennis balls at them if I have to. I'm not leaving." Of course, we won. And I marveled that not only did I not have to stand up for my little brother a long time ago, he can stand up for me now.

When we started warming up, he confessed "Yeah, bullying a bunch of Asian girls off the court was easy. I don't know if I could have stood up to a bunch of big guys." Heh heh...

We were quite the sight on the court. Me hobbling around on my sore ankle, not able to chase down any balls, and him with no backhand swing to speak of. Kicked his ass 6-2. We drove down to pick up some sandwiches to eat at my place and looked at the family portraits I just picked up. We promised to play again next week. I look forward to it!