You lose some

Basketball:  Went 1-2 against the Haslett teams; lost 28-19 or something like that.  The team just wasn’t there…no hustle, got down and never came back.  Christopher had 2 points on 1-3 shooting (I think).  Kevin taped this game and I’ll pull together the Cpher plays into one video later this week.

Monday:  We got 10 inches of snow Sunday….I needed to go to Brighton for work.  Figured I’d take Kevin, Ashton, and Matthew to the slopes.  But, it snowed further into the night than I thought and that made testing the roads a non-starter.  Then the stomach bug hits me (it’s only visited Cpher twice this year) and Suzanne has to spend her day off with two boys who were way too full of energy….

Soccer:  Matthew played two games Sunday; the ‘top’ team of U9’s lost to the TNT U10’s 6 – 5.  Matthew spent the second half in the goal and gave up three goals, only one of which he really should have stopped.  He took one shot clean off the face and was done for a little bit. 

Matthew was asked to play with the ‘other’ U9’s against the TNT U9 girls.  They lost 5 –1; those girls are good and when Matthew and Greg weren’t in the game the girls had their way with the overmatched boys…..

You win some, you lose some. Part 2

This post is not about basketball.  This post is about something that will never never never happen again. 

Friday night, after attending the annual Pancake Supper Fundraiser (Cpher = 12…they were small, but still….) and the OHS basketball game, Suzanne and I left the boys to the dubious guardianship of their big brother (more on this later in this post) and head off to Battle Creek for our first visit to the new casino, Firekeeper’s.

We arrive, we walk around the floor for about 20 minutes just seeing where everything is located and checking the place out and then we go our separate ways; Suzanne off to some slot machines and me off to some table games.

About an hour in (right before I was supposed to meet her up front),  I’m ready to tell Suzanne that I’m not a fan of this place and it’s time to go.  I’ve lost at blackjack; I’ve lost a craps, I had a small rally in blackjack, I lost it all back.  Suzanne has texted me that she has found success and had a major win at a video slot (I couldn’t even begin to explain how she won…..the game involved a bonus round of animated pigs and matching numbers for the multipliers, and she matched a lot of numbers and…voila!  A tidy profit.

Almost every time I go to a casino, I will stop at the roulette table and take some of my chips and put them on numbers.  I’m not a big fan of roulette, I don’t like actually sitting there for long periods of time with the actual roulette chips (they are different than the casino chips) BUT, I will stop, and if I have a few $5 chips, I’ll throw them on some important numbers.

I’m walking over to meet Suzanne, pass a table, stop, grab three of the surviving $5 chips in my pocket (like fish from the county fair…there were only a few left!) and place them on 4, 12, and 23.

The ball spins around….and lands on 4!   35-1 payout on my $5 and my outlook on the new casino is a little better.

Place your bets again……put $5 back on 12 and 23, leave my other $5 on 4.   And the ball spins around and lands on 4 again!  

The winnings are pushed over, again, by the dealer.  One of the more pleasant things that can happen while at a casino is watching your initial bets (of $5 red chips) turn into $25 green chips as you continue to do well.  I have a large stack of $25 chips now.

So, hey, what the heck, play with house money right?  Leave the $5 on 4 and 23.  Put green chips on 1, 12, and 30.  And this time 12 hits! 

!!!

As I relayed to Suzanne later, I am certain that a squeak of joy left my mouth when I realized I had $25 on a winning number with a 35-1 to payout to come.  And the happiness when your red chips turn into green chips is nothing compared to the happiness of watching your green turn into black ($100 chips).   Maybe one thing tops it; having the dealer have to call over to the pit boss to pay you out…..and that happened here.

As the next spin comes around I have green chips situated on a whole slew of major numbers.  1, 3, 4, 12, 23, 26, 30.   The ball rolls around the perimeter of the bowl…..and lands on 1!  More black chips head my way.   Pit boss wanders a little closer…..

One more spin, the same numbers, and 13 comes up and I scoop up my black chips and go to find Suzanne…..because now I’m late!   I find her, she is happy, because she has won about $500, and then is a little mad, because it becomes apparent that I outdid that in a big way and have stolen all her thunder!    My total winnings are about 3x that.

So, what are the odds of that happening in a row like that?  Suzanne and I talked about that on the way home.  38 spots on the wheel (1-36, green 0, and green 00).

1st spin (38/3) * 2nd spin (38/3) * third spin (38/5) * fourth spin (38/7) = 6620 to 1.  

A few miscellaneous notes:

dubious guardianship:  Suzanne wondered aloud….I wonder if we could stay late, get a hotel room, and drive home in the morning?  And I certainly think Kevin is more than responsible enough to handle that.  But….he sleeps like the dead!  He doesn’t wake up for anything!  And I say that to Suzanne, and we promptly forget about that idea…..have a late night snack, head home, get to the front door; it’s locked.  While fishing for keys, Suzanne rings the doorbell.  No answer.  Dogs are barking at us, Suzanne rings the doorbell again, nothing.  Finally get the key, go in through the garage, come around and Kevin is stumbling to the door saying “I wasn’t asleep, I wasn’t asleep…..”

party fall-out:  and….not much else on this front.  Kevin did say that his buddy Henry did emphatically say Kevin was coming to the next party; all the cute girls want to dance with him!

phil-:  as the kids refer to it; philharmonic to you and me.  Kevin found out he made it into the main orchestra next year….

You win some, you lose some

Game 1:  We take the court against Haslett 3; we haven’t faced them before BUT one of the engineer’s I work with has a son on this team.  We’ve been talking basketball all year and comparing notes….I know that we solidly beat teams that Haslett 3 has lost to.  So, hoping for good things.

We won 35-25….pretty much held a ten point lead from the first quarter on.  Christopher had by far his best game of the year; he had 10 points (as you can see above and had way more than 10 rebounds (in the 1st quarter alone he was at 6…) on his way to his first double-double.   They had one big guy and Christopher just outclassed him the entire time.  A good start, and we continued on in the ‘winner’s’ bracket to….

Game 2:  Against Haslett 2.  Some shocking results so far in the tourney; the other Okemos team lost and lost again; they’re gone.  The Holt team that beat us, lost and lost again; they’re gone.  So, we think things might be looking good for our tourney title chances…..

Not.  Lost 24-21.  Christopher played ok, he had 3 points, a ton of rebounds, and every single time we took him out of the game we got absolutely crushed on the boards….he had to go back in. 

Our leading scorer all year (you can see him at the top of the chart above) had two points and fouled out.  and we still were down by one with less than a minute to play.  We inbound the ball down by one, we get the ball inside to Christopher who is fouled while taking a shot; he gets two free throws with about 40 seconds left.  I look over at Suzanne in the stands and she has her hands together with this anguished look on her face; Cpher has gone 1 for 2 from the line during this game.

Missed them both.  Haslett gets the rebound, and we’re chasing the lead now and they made two free throws and that was it.

Want to be clear here that it certainly wasn’t Cpher’s fault we lost….we made some just crazy boneheaded plays that led to some easy shots for the other team and I don’t even want to talk about the foul at the end of the first half (they threw up a heave at the basket from behind half court….the refs call a foul and give the kid three shots…..he made one, but hey, that one point counted).

The tournament was at Haslett; I was very surprised (although I guess I shouldn’t have been) at the amount of noise the Haslett fans and parents made during Cpher’s free throw attempts to try and get him off of his game…..I guess I expect it in High School and on up, but, was surprised at just how much of it there was for the 4th grade trainer league.

What’s Next:  Drop into the ‘loser’s’ bracket tomorrow for a 10 am against Haslett 2 (we didn’t play any of the Haslett teams in the regular season; we’ve gone 3-3 in the tourney).  The early scouting knows one thing…they are the biggest team we’ve faced…easily three kids bigger than everyone else on our team BUT the big guy.  Christopher will certainly be logging a lot of minutes tomorrow morning.  Need to win four straight times tomorrow to win the title; a tough chore.

Getting Ready For the Weekend

The 4-day weekend that the kids (but not the adults) have off has begun.  Spring seems to have arrived (it’s windy and warm, and the snow is gone) and the single digit temperatures look to be gone for good.

This kid had a scrimmage against the other Okemos team last night.  His friends at school, on the other team, told Cpher that they were going to ‘kick their butts”.  Cpher was offended by this, but, the result wasn’t far off that, we lost, 22-16.  We weren’t really in it; I’m glad we had the scrimmage because a few of the boys just flat out forgot what to do in a game; we weren’t aggressive and a few of our players turned away from open shots that we absolutely need them to take.

Christopher played ok; the other team’s center is big and a little more athletic so he’s a challenge and Christopher held up ok.  First game at 11:40 tomorrow morning….

When I say no, I mean no

Kevin:  The title of the post is about him.  You can find those details at the alternate protected site.  The only thing I’ll say here is that I never had these problems in high school……

Christopher:  A no-basketball weekend; the season-ending tournament is next week.  We are either the #1 or #2 seed in the double-elimination tournament and the whole weekend will be devoured by that event.

The report card came home a week or two ago…first time Cpher has letter grades.    It wasn’t bad, it wasn’t great (it did look nothing like Kevin report cards…) and there is lots of room for improvement.  One positive is that there are no areas identified where he’s behind….which is definitely a step up from last year.

Matthew:  Went snowboarding with Kevin and the Winter Walden gang on Saturday.  As always, absolutely loved it.  Passed the first three levels and couldn’t stop showing Kevin or Dad or Mom (or anyone) his new badge.  Wants to go back again, and again, and again.  It’s a real problem that this conflicts with basketball so much…..not an issue for the end of this year but it will be a big issue next year.

Matthew’s report card centered around the word ‘focus’…..I’d guess 75% of boy report cards go there as well…..

Family Feud

Kevin:  Did not get the part in the musical; he’s in the chorus.  All are ok with that.  Glad he got the experience of going back to the call-back.  He did qualify for State Solo & Ensemble, but, that’s one of the weekends we’ll be on vacation.  We offered to stay (have him fly with one of us down to catch up) but he was pretty ok with just not doing it.  Has his audition for the Okemos Philharmonic Orchestra (the main HS group) on Tuesday…..the scales he might have to perform are among the most difficult he’s been asked to do yet. 

Christopher:  We travelled out to Ionia (again) for the last regular season basketball game.  We fell behind early, 12-5 after the first quarter, but, from that point on, we didn’t give up another point until there were 3 minutes left in the fourth quarter and breezed our way to a 25-18 win.  Really remarkable that we held them without a point for that long.  The Ionia team had something we haven’t had to deal with in a while; a player taller than Christopher (he was probably 2 inches taller….and at least 30-40 pounds heavier.  Christopher looked svelte next to him). 

Mom and Dad continue to be flummoxed and amazed by how well Christopher is doing; he held this kid to nothing, zip, zilch, zero while outrebounding him and scoring six points of his own.  He caught the ball down low once and while being swarmed by the big dude and his teammates calmly dished the ball off to his wide open teammate for an assist; he stole the ball right out of the big guy’s hands after one rebound and was dribbling away when the kid shoved Cpher and picked up a foul; he came back to help break the press in the fourth quarter and did a great job of that. 

Need to start considering more basketball camps for this kid. 

Matthew:  Another game of basket-rugby today but, surprise, they call the kids to the center of the court at the beginning of the game and say, hey, it’s game 4 of 8, we’re going to start calling more fouls, and travelling, and double-dribble.  And the game looked more like basketball.

 

I think this is off one of the team’s set plays; the guard comes in towards the basket towards the middle and kicks it out to Matthew, who has moved out from under the basket to receive the pass.  And then he drives in and tries to score.

This is a Matthew special…..he’s collected the rebound at the other end and is just hauling butt down court for the layup

It gets lost with his gigantic brother around, but, Matthew’s pretty tall.  And this kid isn’t going to have a chance at making this shot….

  

The other team has rushed down for a lay-up and mishandled the ball; Matthew has collected it and is going to head down for a layup.

More of the same; this time with Austen setting a pick for him.

And the same rebound-layup drill as before

This game of basketball had one very different feature than the others, aside from the new presence of rule enforcement.  The other team was coached by two of the college students who run the after school program at Bennett Woods; they only had six players today.  I was dragooned to run the clock again, noticed this, and asked, hey, would you like Christopher to play?

They say sure, I call Christopher over, and Matthew’s team, all from Bennett Woods and all who know Christopher, start moaning, oh no, not him, that’s not fair.

The final score of the game was 36-20 for Matthew’s team; the end result was never really in doubt.  Christopher kept the score from being 50-6…..

 

Matthew’s been a little mouthy recently that he’s better in basketball than Christopher.  And in many respects it’s true; he dribbles better, and faster, and has a better shot.  But the two half-quarters they played against each other proved one thing….Matthew may be all of that, but he has really no chance of scoring on his brother one-on-one.  Cpher is quick enough to stop Matthew from doing just about anything….

 

….and Matthew doesn’t have much of a chance of stopping his brother from scoring either. 

like always, they had a lot fun playing against each other…..there were a lot of smiles and laughing.  Other players on Matthew’s team either a) flat out said they don’t want to guard Cpher or b) after having to guard Cpher for a while asked to move to someone else…

Christopher had ten points total and rebounds galore…..really, he probably prevented Matthew’s team from a lot more scoring opportunities just by scooping up every rebound.  Cpher’s team best play was the airball from outside that Christopher would just grab as it came in and put the ball back up for the basket….

Most of these pictures are of Christopher on offense; it’s just the way the half went….the one notable time that Matthew had a rebound-and-go situation Christopher was right with him….and when Matthew pulled up for the shot and took it Christopher swatted the ball away so hard it ended up out of the court. 

 

All that being said, Matthew had a great game, 8 points I think, and did about the best that anybody on his team is going to do against Cpher….at least he’s not afraid of standing up to him.

Cpher wasn’t thrilled with the game afterwards (you can’t steal the ball, you have to play man-to-man always, etc), but, it did let him do something that he doesn’t do much in his games….dribble with the ball. 

Composing

It took some doing, but I finally figured out a way to get to hear what Kevin has been composing.

He’s been doing his ‘composing’ on the software we bought him a year or so back; the downside of that is that it only installs on one computer at a time AND when his computer crashed (and I had to reinstall xp) the sound drivers died….so, it’s been an issue.

Finally decided to install the trial version on my computer.  So, finally heard it, but there is no way to export the file to a format I could post here.

So, I taped it.  The sound quality sucks, it’s a midi file so it’s basic electronic notes, but, you get the picture.  You’ll have to crank up the volume on the video player and your computer to hear it.

Click for the waltz.

I was completely caught off-guard by this; I didn’t realize he was writing for multiple instruments and very surprised as I first listened to it.  Not sure why, or if he realizes, how minimalistic the work is…..