In the Game

After being married to a coach for nearly 10 years, I have come to appreciate the value of a good strategy in every game. You always have to anticipate what's going to happen. Then, when it happens, know immediately what you're going to do next or where you're going next. This is true for any kind of game.

It's even true for garage sale-ing.

Seriously.

When we are faced with a village-wide sale, you gotta have a strategy to hit the most places in the least amount of time and possibly find something you really like or need or just want. Then you're a winner.

Today, Carter and I went to the village-wide sale in Port Edwards (on the south side of Rapids). First we had to stop at the walk-in clinic so they could check out the cough he's been dealing with this week. There is a Whooping Cough scare in the area and it has gone around his school, so I figured it was better to be safe than sorry. When you walk in and tell them it's something related to a cough, though, they quickly hand you a surgical mask (ala Michael Jackson) to wear. Just to be safe.

Turns out Carter just has allergies. So we got medicine and it's not a big whoop. (pun intended)

We were free to head to Port. We did park and walk a lot. Making lots of stops and really not having a strategy of what we hoped to find. I knew I'd probably find a few books and Carter said he just wanted to find "some good junk." Uh-oh. And he did. He begged and pleaded to buy a bar stool for $5 -- just to have down in the basement when he's playing video games or something. I finally talked him out of it when he found something better and far more useful -- a nice left-handed putter. Now that was a worthy $4 purchase.

But not as good as my big find. Ladies, feast your eyes on this...

For a mere dime, I got this collectible issue of Dynamite magazine ... well, collectible to Ponch fans like me! After that, there was no need to shop further! I won that "game"!

We had a real game to get to anyway. The kids Carter babysat for last summer were playing during the youth sports Opening Day today at the Kellner fields. Since hubby is a board member, he had to work it all day and evening -- selling concessions, helping with field maintenance and whatever else was needed. With games going on at all 5 fields, there was plenty happening.

We watched Aaron play at 2 p.m. and then went back to see Allie play at 6 p.m. In between there, I came across these guys at the park...

Yes, we had the Miller Park sausages (their twins, anyway) visiting our fields while my Twins were down at Miller Park beating the Brewers for a second day. Whoot!

Normally, I wouldn't pose with one but since our neighbor's son was working under cover, he humored me. I would not have wanted his job today. It officially got up to 89 degrees! Uff da.

That's one of the reasons Carter and I came home between those 2 games. Also, he had some reading to do and I had to start my mints. I learned I can make them at 65 MPH -- that's Mints Per Hour. I got one pan of 65 done and some laundry, then it was back to the park.

Came home and kept tabs on our nephew Colin's super stock race. He is racing over in Minnesota tonight at the Elko Speedway. I would have loved to have gone but we have a commitment tomorrow and I know I couldn't have driven back tonight. So through texts with my sister-in-law, we learned Colin qualified 6th, took 5th in the heat race and was slated to start on the pole for the 40-lap feature. Right now they are in a rain delay so I will just have to cross my fingers that he gets his "game" tonight!

In the meantime, this girl's gonna go hit the showers!