Beff's Dad

I should probably be writing for pay right now since I have two assignments I'd love to get finished before school is out on Friday, but I thought I should first tell you about the 15th anniversary trip. I surprised Clay with a trip down to the place of our courtship...Texas A&M University (whoop if ya' can). We spent Thurs. through Sat. walking around campus, eating at familiar places, updating our former student wardrobes, and mostly just taking it easy. A&M played t.u. in baseball Friday night and it was a GREAT game. couldn't have asked for better. From inning one to the victorious end the crowd was raucous. We were sitting around a pretty good contingent of teasips and some particularly vocal A&M students, which is always an exciting mix. They shared unpleasantries throughout the course of the game, but nothing too uncomfortably ugly. It was all in good fun, and the Ags pulled out the win on a wild pitch with bases loaded in the bottom of the tenth. A good time was had by all, except possibly all those people in orange who left the field with scowls on their faces. But the biggest coup of the trip was that I pulled some strings and Clay and I had free lodging at the VP's on-campus very large and nice home. He doesn't actually live there, but uses it for entertaining, student meetings and such. He was in New Zealand and was thrilled to let The Hopkins stay when he heard from my former Intramural boss that we were coming to town for our anniversary. That "Student Worker of the Year - 1990" is still paying off for me, I tell you. And that's a good lesson for us all...do a good job, even if it's just some hourly minimum wage gig. You never know where your boss will end up down the road.

So upon our return we had Brandon's last regular season game in the hotter than Sheol afternoon. They lost, and finished in 3rd place, which is still quite an accomplishment for them. They'll have a tournament that I can only hope will be played in the evenings, because I don't know anyone, child or adult, who enjoyed being out there Sat. when it was 200 degrees (or something like that). The Abster has her last game tomorrow night and I'm pretty sure she's invited everyone she knows.

And speaking of the Abbinator, I've been reminded of a story that I failed to share earlier when we were doing that. It's funny, and I want to share it now just to show that I was not the only recipient of her zings.

I think she was 3 years old -
me: who's your favorite mom?
Ab: you are
me: who's your favorite brother?
Ab: Brandon
me: who's your favorite daddy?
Ab (deadpan): Beff's (Beth's) dad.