9/28/05

Softball: Ehud’s Mission (A Final Try at Upping our Cognitive Stats)

Dear People,

Congratz to all on last week’s absolutely superb 19-17 paragon of see-sawing aerobic competitude, and I’m not saying that just because I like to coin words that give our tongue a certain morphemic vibrancy. In any case, with two outs and two on in the bottom of the 9th, my team still trailed Jeremy’s by two slender runs, and yet with a weary Tom O. on the mound and Peter at the plate, I could practically taste our imminent rally and triumph.

As I expected, Jeremy’s outfielders moved into the shallow grasses just behind their teammates, and thus as the tension mounted and time froze still, I signaled our hero to give them the shock of their lives by blasting the game-winning ball well over their presumptuous little heads. Unfortunately, Peter may have misunderstood the conceptual requirements of the task at hand, and thus that final hit of the day was a dribbling grounder directly back to the center of the mound. In fairness, this trajectory would have been perfection in motion—had we been playing miniature golf.

Of course managing expectations is what this entire unaffiliated email-organized community is all about, and while I know a lot of you have been frightened by the constant change in game location and time, you have no choice but to remain nimble and alert. For example, in the following paragraph I’m going to tell you that this week’s game will start at 11AM, not noon, and then I’ll repeat the same vital information in the confirmation letter. And yet history tells us that approximately two of 22 players will still show up at noon, not 11, suggesting a certain Dufusesque Lack of Focus, or DLOF.

I mention this because I have yet to hear back from any of the three UC Berkeley MacArthur fellows, and yet just for the record, I happen to think that those of you who do suffer from DLOF (or as it’s sometimes referred to, ‘illiteracy’) may in fact benefit from Lu Chen’s work with non-neural cells emptied of most of their content. In all candor, I probably couldn’t distinguish a non-neural cell from a toaster-oven, but I do know that nothing is more analogous to the way synapses form at the junction between nerve cells than the way our best hitters meld bat and ball, and if that isn’t enough to make a humble synaptic rock star crave a delicious game of softball, then I don’t know what is. And therefore there will be a game at San Pablo #2 this Sunday at 11AM, IF I get enough commits by this Friday morning…Raymond




9/30/05


Softball: 11 (not 12)

Dear People,

There will be a game at San Pablo #2 this Sunday at 11AM, which is just like 12PM except that it’s actually one full hour earlier. The point is that if you show up at noon, you will be seen as an illiterate bozo by all your friends and peers, so I really suggest you arrive at 11.

As of now there are still seven slots left, which means that you are once again welcome to commit anybody you know, so long as they are kind, decent folk who understand that softball is a serious business, and certainly not a game.

$3 for the field/See ya Sunday at at 11….Raymond 845-7552

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