tennis, life and a few things in between

I teamed up with a 3.5 guy vs 4.0 and an unrated guy who’s 3.5~4.0. They won the toss and opted to serve.
0-1
1-1
1-2
1-3: I lost my serve.
It was a great match, my partner and I played really well – yes, I remembered to turn to the side to hit. Soon we caught up to 5-5.
5-6
5-7: I lost my serve again and we lost the set.
During the change over, the 4.0 said to me,
“.. .. we should have beat you at 2 ..”
I agreed.
-:) don’t think I’m overly competitive.
Just then, my partner walked by and heard, and disagreed loudly:
“You’ve some nerve to say that ..” He’s continuously walking toward the baseline and talking ..
“It’s great tennis we just played .. ” He said to me.
“We played a while back.. .. you were so bad .. ” He said to the 4.0.
We stopped at 2-2 due to time.

E Shore to Bayview: Wed. Mar 13, 2013 at 5:23pm

I did 20 laps in the pool before heading to the match. I got there almost an hour before the match time. The front desk kid (he looked like a high school kid) was friendly and chatty.
Nic was there long before I arrived and Le came second. The lineup was pretty set since, well .. .. since I was playing. Le picked Nic and Jim left holding the bag. The old bag.
Our opponents won the toss and he went to serve. We broke hers then I lost mine promptly. I didn’t hold serve in the first set and we lost at 3.
Second set, I continually losing my serve.  At 1-3 Jimmy went to serve and held. He Held again. And for the first time, I held mine for a change. During the change over, the bubbly girl started to count the games wrong. She insisted its 5-3. And even took out a note pad, prepared to do the math. I was wondering how would she count, tic tac or what?
The pole by the net has the numbers backward, 1 at the top when all others have the larger number at the top. She later confessed that the pole did her in.
Anyway, she served and won. Jimmy then served out a love game. We were still at 4-5.
The guy held every single serve but lost this one.
We were at 5-5.
I held mine, miraculously!!
She lost hers.
Jimmy started the third set tie break and won.
He lost one and won one.
I lost both
She won one and lost one.
We were at 3-4
Jim won one and lost one, at 4-5.
For better or worst, we then took the rest and won the match.
Unfortunately my team lost .. I was very happy to win my first 8.0 match in 2013 even I didn’t know why we lost first set and didn’t know what’s happened that we won the next two. Jiming pointed out that I was merely floating (as vs hitting) the ball during the first set.
Throughout the match, Jimmy kept telling me to turn to hit. After the match, he commented that having a positive mindset is important,
“You know you’re going to win .. or play to win.”
Thanks partner!!
Guess one more thing to remember.
Sportime at Syosset has decent courts, both hard and har tru. The opposing captain was friendly.

I don’t think the phase senior moment applies to me any more because I’m in that zone permanently.

Tonight’s match time was at 8:00 but for some reason, I remembered it as 8:30. So here’s what I did leading up to a late arrival:

Finishing up a Pilate class at 6:30. Went home and cooked spaghetti for my better half – can’t fault me to being a good wife -:). Thinking there’s plenty time, actually a lot I decided to grocery shopping. After paying for a few items that I didn’t really need, on my way out of the supermarket I saw this cookie sitting pretty. St. Patrick’s Day is coming up, my mates and I can enjoy it before the match. So this senior went back in, waited online all over again.

the little cookies that almost ..

There was a little traffic on the highway. So I took out the phone to call a friend. Then I saw the message from Wai.
“Where are you?” He demanded.
“On Grand Central..”
“You’re on Court 7.” He said.
What court 7!? Aren’t you guys at the lounge waiting? Suddenly a chill set in ..
Did I mess up the match time?
I sure did.
After hung up, within a minute or two, the cute little gas tank indicator light up. I was running out of gas.
How convenient.
How fortunate.

Heart attack started to form. Wait, my heart is made of stone. Immune to it. Lucky me.

Making the story short, I raced to the club in a record time without running down anyone, and sprinted on to the court. The minute arm of the white shabby clock was only a fraction above the horizontal position. Phew.

Our court has a missing player. The opposing captain explained that

.. She was running late because of a personal issue and informed us that she would not be able to get there until at least 8:30, but possibly later. We told her that anything after 15 minutes would result in a forfeit, so if it was a problem she shouldn’t show up…

Not sure this is the right way to handle the lateness. Where’s consideration for other three players? However the missing player’s partner told me that she messed up days, thought it’s this Sunday.

After the match, Jenn berated me: “Arrival 15 minutes before the match is still too late for a captain…” Okay miss, I hear you. Will improve next time.

We parted nicely after the match but a little disagreement via emails followed the following day. I asked the coordinator how to handle the lateness when I about to enter the scores – maybe the opposing captain wanted to put someone else in that forfeit spot? But the captain wasn’t pleased, took it the wrong way and protested that I was late too. Better way to handle this, perhaps to email the opposing captain directly.

A little issue on names, not a big deal:

Its meredith wilson 4.0 or meredith brady wilson im not sure why i thought it was baxter

Our first loss came on Feb 8’s rescheduled match that’s played on March 4th, and it was two courts only. We lost 1D in the third set tie break, won 2D and forfeited the 3D. Do the paper plates as score card look familiar? Pix on FB

Mar 4, 2013 at Westside

~~ Some interesting lineup sheets ~~

 
The Queens final, April 21, 2013
The wrong name, Mar 13, 2013
The Manhattan final, Mar 3, 2013
The Manhattan quarter final, Feb 27
No score card, Jan 22, 2013
A sponsor, Nov 12, 2012
A paper plate, Mar 28, 2011
From London to Paris, Feb 4, 2010