Nearing the End

We faced off against two teams Tuesday. Both large.

Here was my proud crew.

No, wait. There were a couple warming up behind the chairs, too.

Five of my eight wrestlers stepped on the mat. I asked for multiple matches to work the ref and my boys as usual.

"You're going to throw us right into the grinder, aren't you Coach?" one asked.

"Yup."

And they did well.

We got slaughtered in Culpeper, but my three present veterans went 3-0, 3-0, and 2-1 here. My two first year wrestlers were shut out, but life is hard as a first year. I'd have loved a win for them, but tough days make the breakthrough days sweeter.

I was very happy with the effort given. Now if only I could get that in every practice for a full week...

My three missing wrestlers were sick. Two of them came to practice on Monday and sat out. Both were out of school match day and one parent let me know his son had the flu. The third sicky had bronchitis, but he came to support the team.

I was sick, too. I didn't really have much choice. I don't have an assistant, so if I didn't go, nobody would. I warned the other coaches and didn't shake any hands. I offered an elbow bump to show there was no disrespect intended. Cough drops helped when my voice started to abandon me.

The season is almost over. We're trying to finish strong!

Immigration Ban - Not a Fan

And while my life is busy and proceeding as usual, the macro-scale picture for the United States is volatile and split. The amount of zealous, blind partisanship I see online from both fronts bothers me.

I worry about the veracity of everything I read and wish others stopped to, as well.

Three observations:

1 - Ironically, Trump has been the antithesis of most politicians. He really has set out to do exactly what he campaigned and said he would.

2 - There have been a few things that I approve of or don't have as strong of feelings about.

3 - I am so glad I did not vote for him. Not that that will change anything.

Who knows when Shane will read this or if it will hit the history books, but I figured I'd pick one thing to mention briefly: The immigration ban.

Trump signed an executive order that included this:

"I hereby proclaim that the immigrant and nonimmigrant entry into the United States of aliens from countries referred to in section 217(a)(12) of the INA, 8 U.S.C. 1187(a)(12), would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, and I hereby suspend entry into the United States, as immigrants and nonimmigrants, of such persons for 90 days from the date of this order "

He listed seven states, all middle-eastern and Muslim majority, but omitted several other similar states that have stronger business ties to the US.

Proponents for it online say that it will make our country safe. It will keep out terrorists who could be hiding as refugees. They also point out that Obama passed a similar "ban" for six months on refugees from Iraq.

Opponents say that the ban is unconstitutional and violates the spirit of the United States itself. They say it targets Muslims which violate the 1st Amendment, leaves refugees in deadly situations, and makes the US look like racist assholes to the rest of the world.  

Proponents call Opponents snowflakes and fools.

Opponents call Proponents racist assholes.

Both sides can probably agrees that the speed of the executive action took them by surprise. It happened overnight and caused chaos at international airports. There are stories of couples split, mothers unable to nursefeed children, and lawyers swarming to offer pro-bono help to people trapped for hours and hours. The Acting Attorney General (leftover from Obama's Presidency and holding down the fort during confirmation hearings) went on record to refuse to enforce something she thought was un-Constitutional and Trump fired her.

Honestly, it's a mess. I couldn't be more against the travel ban. I feel like I could write an essay or a research paper on exactly why.

That said, it's 11 PM, Shane and I have the flu, he woke me up at 4 AM today, refused to nap, and this is a backdated blog.

So I'll go with one quick point: The whole thing reeks of fear politics.

If the point of the ban is to increase the safety of the US then the people who want the ban to to prevent ISIS from "recruiting refugees as they have stated they want to do," have just approved what could be the biggest ISIS refugee recruitment tool to date. Over 900 state diplomats signed a petition stating their dissent to the order.

Furthermore, it alienates our allies.

For example:  I read about Trump's meeting with the Australian leader and was dismayed about how moronic Trump sounded. From what I read, there was a previous agreement where the US would accept 1,250 refugees that the Australians had detained if those refugees passed through a rigorous screening process.

Supposedly, Trump insisted it was a horrible deal for the US to accept 2,000 refugees when one of them would be the next Boston bomber. I don't believe everything I read online, but when the POTUS tweets this?

Donald J. Trump 

✔@realDonaldTrump

Do you believe it? The Obama Administration agreed to take thousands of illegal immigrants from Australia. Why? I will study this dumb deal!

It sounds like the story with the Australian PM repeatedly trying to correct him on the numbers is correct.

After the disagreement the PM, Malcom Turnbull, gave a much more intelligent response than a tweet.

"Look, I'm not going to comment on a conversation between myself and the President of the United States other than what we have said publicly, and you can surely understand the reasons for that," [Turnbull] said. "I'm sure you can understand that. It's better these conversations are conducted candidly, frankly, privately. If you'll see reports of them, I'm not going to add to them." (CNN)

Crazy times. Some Republicans have voiced their dissent, but the majority have remained silent. If what I read online is any indication, the nation itself is split and there's a very wide gap between the sides.

I'm waiting to see what the Legislative and Judicial responses will be. Will Trump's president highlight and cement the checks and balances system? Will it strain it?

God reigns either way.

Stay tuned.  

PokeWalks

Guests are great, but trying to keep Shane inside all day is murder. I took him on a couple of "Poke-walks."

Shane was ecstatic. He was a fount of pokefacts. I told him I enjoyed exploring and being with him and not the pokemon. He was not deterred.

We walked 2.4 km Sunday afternoon to try and hatch an egg. We bumped into one of my students and he had a laugh. I'm not sure Shane even noticed we stopped to talk. There was a Horsea afoot.

G&C

Guests? Woo-hoo! Genevieve and Chris drove down Friday night to visit for the weekend.

Shane's always happy to see people. It's been a while since Gen and Chris have gotten to see Shane. They were both amazed at how much older he was.

Shane taught Chris how to play Angry Birds Star Wars on the PS3. Eventually, Chris snuck away and the adults talked.

We went out for tacos for lunch.

Carrie took my coat and threw it on Shane, so they could hunt for a Jigglypuff while the rest of us stood in line.

For this, she had to wear the cone of shame.

The cone looked like a laugh-riot, so Shane wanted to don it next.

Really, it was from a gift. Gen and Chris gave us the expansion to Exploding Kittens.

Each purchase comes with a cone of shame for whoever forgets whose turn it is.

We had a chill day. We did go to the barn to check on Mira. I stayed in the truck when Shane passed out. Carrie, Gen, and Chris went in.

Saturday evening, Genevieve finished a dragon blanket she made for Shane. He was quick to cuddle.

We saved the world when he went to sleep (three times!).

The cats moved in on the blanket, too.

Sunday morning, we said our goodbyes.

Carrie served Genevieve tea in a shark bowl. It almost ate her face (it was a miracle she didn't laugh and have tea explode out her nose).

Shane and I slid out for the 11:00 AM service while Genevieve and Chris packed and got one last chance to chat among adults.

I must have gained give pounds over the weekend. Carrie bought a tardis cookie jar to show off, and (of course) she kept filling it with cookies. No one complained.

Sign-Ups

Thursday night, I took Shane to sign up for tee-ball. He was adamantly opposed, but I think that's because he wanted Mommy to play Pokemon on her phone.

It was only $35! I'm debating whether or not it would be too much to sign him up for soccer, too. He's grown to like that one. TKD is ongoing, so tee-ball practice, soccer practice, TKD, and games would take up a lot of nights a week.

On the other hand, when wrestling ends I should be able to pick him up from school earlier. That would give him time to play outside. He's super social and events would keep us from watching Pokemon too much. Hmmm.....

And look! Cool mural.

Engineering

A little boredom is a good thing. Sometimes, I feel bad when I allow Shane to be bored on purpose, but then there's moments like this:

I love it. The idea was doomed to fail, but I admired it anyway. We'll try again later, Shane.

For Carrie

Bucket's a goofy cat.

12 hour Wednesday

Match day. It was an hour away. All of the kids huddled in the back. I normally let them have some space to talk while I listen in and talk to the bus driver (who turned out to be Shane's). I'd yell at them on the mat soon enough. 

It takes a different kind of courage to show up somewhere you know you're going to get destroyed. My goal was for some close matches to build experience. If anyone won, that would be bonus. My boys are learning, but we're far from elite.

The other team put on a pinning clinic. Cradles were the order of the day.

It was tough. I kept it constructive and their morale was up, but would have loved some more success to bolster my own. It was expected given the competition.

I have 8 kids when everyone is healthy (7 showed up tonight). Our opponent had over 30. Their coach told me he normally has 40-60 try out and then he makes cuts. Meanwhile, I accept anyone with a pulse (If they show up without one I assign them to the team and start CPR).

I will lose half my squad to the high school next year. Another is moving. I have to find a way to replenish, or the team could disappear. I tried to start a club at the middle school, but no one came. I plan to target the upper elementary school this off season.

If the team survives another year, I'll have coached as long as my first coach, Coach Fredrick. It was only three years, but being on a healthy team left an impact. I'd like to hang on longer than that!

There are lots of other small hurdles on the way. For one, my AD is poorly organized. He never contacted the high school about our home meets, so I called to set them up. I double checked on one of our matches and got a call back saying, "We don't have a middle school team." Yesterday, I noticed that the schedule I was sent and the one posted listed different locations for a match. I had to text the other coach to confirm (and the new schedule was wrong). I've gotten in the habit of checking in with other coaches before matches and the school's front office to make sure my kids are dismissed.

Next year, I may try and take over scheduling altogether. I've made a few executive decisions about finding tournaments and matches already (it helps when the team parents have connections). I'm trying to set up our own tournament in February to end the season. Last year, I got a day's notice about the end of the season and an award night. I want this season to end with an event instead of a fizzle.

Meanwhile, the HS coach took four kids to a tri-meet in another county. I had almost double his numbers. I told him that a couple of mine could weigh as much as one of his.

He replied, "A full team by 2018-19!"

We've got a good core group of kids. If they stick around they could be the seed to start a decent program.

A Goof Became an Opportunity

Shane came home with red on his behavior chart. He "talked excessively" through the math lesson and over the teacher.

I let him know I was mad. The excuses started and I shut them down. Shane started the "I can't listen/I'm dumb" negative talk and I shut that down, too.

"Don't make it more. Don't make it less. You will do better tomorrow if you want to see electronics again," I said.

And yet, I also saw an opportunity. I told Shane he was lucky he had wrestling. That would give him a chance to see friends and do something even though he was in trouble. THAT gave him a positive attitude! Carrie came out to watch this time, too.

Best practice yet. Shane was more focused than I've seen him. He was still floppity, but on task 85% of the time is fantastic for him. His first wrestling partner was his the boy from his preschool, Matthew, too.

I wasn't happy when Shane ditched Matthew for a sillier partner. I think Shane wanted to wrestle in the middle of the room.

When we got home, Shane had enough time to shower, write an apology, and head to bed a little early.

We told him he needed the extra rest to be focused tomorrow.....and that there'd be hell to pay if he came home with two bad days in a row.

Guess what? He recovered and had a green Wednesday! Carrie let him catch Pokemon with her and watch TV while I was at a wrestling meet. They even ordered pizza without me. 

Paperwork Monday

Teacher workday = TKD day camp. Here's to hoping Shane learns something. He'll probably qualify for his next belt based on time at the dojang alone.

In other news, I think Carrie likes Pokemon a lot more than she's willing to admit.

Wrestling on a Sunday

From here:

To here:

Carrie had a headache, so Shane and I got out of the house. She felt better and got a lot of cleaning done. Shane scaled bleachers.

I normally avoid wrestling tournaments on Sundays, but this was a nice low key one later in the day. It was for younger kids from Shane's wrestling club and a few other clubs nearby (K-8). The coaches invited my kids to attend if they were available. Four showed up. Shane immediately found one with a phone to latch onto.

By the way, some of my wrestlers are clearly older brothers.

Observe: One pokes...

...and then the other.

Shane makes angry face and they all crack up (minus the kid still playing on his phone).

Shane did a decent job of entertaining himself. I brought his singlet and shoes in case he decided he wanted to wrestle after watching some of his friends. I wasn't going to force him, but if he entertained the thought I would have had him on the mat before he could take it back!

Shane got in trouble at the end when I was coaching my last match. The rounds were a minute to a minute and a half (the clock wasn't visible), but Shane would not stop clamoring for attention/my phone. I told him to wait, but he wouldn't. He jumped on by back, ran in front of me, etc. He cried when dropped the "No video games," between the 2nd and 3rd period. He left me alone the rest of the match, though (my wrestler won, too!). I pulled him aside and told him I would have let him have my phone if he had let me coach. "There's no pause button when my wrestlers are out there. You can wait five minutes. I love you kid, but work on your patience."

There were sniffles until we left. Shane fell asleep on the way home.

That's how we filled most of our Sunday. My wrestlers looked good, but it was more that the other teams looked new.

Women's March Day

Maybe it was a famous day in history, but our focus was on friends! Dylan and Eli came over.

We played with toys,...

...and visited the chickens.

The weather didn't match the season and we spent part of the afternoon running around outside.

Carrie's response to these pictures: "Not the back of my truck!'

Too late, Carrie!

The boys ducked and hid whenever a car came by. Eli was typically slow on the draw.

Krista took Eli home to nap, so we set Dylan and Shane up with Voltron.

It was as if they were glued to the couch. They didn't get up until after Eli had returned.

We had chicken nuggets for dinner.

Friends visiting fits my definition of an fun Saturday.