Scratchin' and a rackin' his brains

2004-10-04 - 10:52 p.m.

I just got back from volleyball open gym not so long ago. I had fun again. It's a great open gym. I broke down and wore kneepads and I think I was a fool to ever stop wearing them. I can't make my knees stop thanking me. My hands and feet are still sore, but there's not much I can do about that. Cute boy #2 did something really bad to his ankle tonight. Let's just say that his foot was no longer in line with his leg. I hope it turns out not to be too bad, but it sure didn't look good to me.

The buff guy was there tonight too. The first time I played against him, he was playing middle front while I was playing middle back and he went up to hit a ball. I totally and embarrassingly did the whole cringing with my eyes closed in the middle of the court thing 'cause it looked like he was going to slam it right at me. He didn't, though, but he noticed what I was doing. "Come on, Euc," he said, "I'm more gentlemanly than that!" While it's a relief to not be, well, dead, it's also annoying to be babied just because I'm a girl. It's interesting the way guys react differently to having girls on the court with them. There are some guys who treat us just like any other player. That's what I like the best, of course. Then there are some guys who treat us like a soft spot, especially coddling us when we're on the other side of the net. While I don't like this, I do understand it because what if the buff guy really had slammed it right in my face? Then everyone else would've totally ragged on him for hitting a girl, so what can he do? Most interestingly are the guys who avoid the whole girl situation by pretending like we don't exist. They don't talk to us or look at us. I find that strange, but it's a relatively common occurence.

Then, of course, there're the losers who think I showed up to volleyball open gym to be flirted with. For the most part I don't mind, as long as they don't take it too far. But there is one guy in particular who bugs the heck out of me. He's oldish (late fifties maybe?) and gross and really not very good at volleyball. And he's always making comments. Tonight during one of my serving streaks, as I was about to serve the ball he yelled out loud enough so that everybody in the gym who wasn't deaf heard, "Euc, you're hot!" I completely ignored him and two serves later he did it again. It's just so gross. But even if it wasn't him, even if it had been one of the cute guys, I still wouldn't want somebody yelling something like that out.

Last night I dreamed that I was surfing with my dad and brother. While I was riding a wave I looked over and saw what I thought was a sharks fin under the water to my right. I headed for shore, but it turned out to just be a bill that had come disconnected from a baseball cap. I was relieved until I looked out to where my dad and brother were surfing and this time really did see a shark. It was about ten feet long. I started shouting and waving my arms for my dad and brother to come in, but they couldn't hear me and didn't see me. Luckily, each of them caught a wave that brought them into shore within hailing distance before the shark got to them. Then I noticed there was a dead grizzly bear on the shore and this was what the shark was after. A couple of German tourists noticed this too and they went over to get a closer look. One of them had a camera with a massive lens which he was shoving right into the shark's mouth to take pictures. Until the shark clamped down on it and wouldn't let go. The man, swearing non-stop in German, had to disconnect the lens from the camera to get the camera free.