There were a half dozen options for riding on Saturday and none of them worked out. But there were plenty of people doing outside things all weekend.
Today (Sunday) was a really nice day for being outside. No one was available to ride and the two group rides available had a long drive to get to the start. I chose an old favorite that brought me into Dartmouth and New Bedford, both are located on the South Coast of Massachusetts.
In Dartmouth I stopped to watch some kids playing soccer. This time of year is the travel teams and other high level leagues. The game I was watching was difficult. It was very young boys, 9 or 10 year olds. It was obviously a 6v6 league, but one team, wearing blue, had only four players. The Yellow team, fielding a full compliment of six, were relentless. Goal after goal after goal, with the coach of the yellow team egging them on for more. The Blue coach was very good at complimenting his players telling them to hang tough and play fair.
There were a few options the coaches could have chosen, including playing like they did. I don't know the circumstances, so I'll hold my judgment and opinion.
I cut short the ride in Dartmouth to get to Buttonwood Park in New Bedford because to the Dog festival going on. Wifey was working with our town's Animal Shelter and I got to parade a couple of dogs around the grounds that were wearing coats which said, "Adopt Me". Both dogs behaved wonderfully, and one had some training.
Fun, Fun, Fun
Big dogs and small dogs, and very big dogs.
Manfred the wonder bird.
There were a couple of carnival type things like face painting for the kids, a hokey DJ and an Ice cream truck. Mostly though it was animal related. A few small town shelters and a some state and local animal organizations.
On the way out, I caught up to a city bike cop. We rode together the two miles to the station taking bikes. We both agreed that he had one of the better jobs on the force.
When I got home, midnight was really excited to see me.
That looks like a lot of fun. I don't think I could just chat up a cop like that, I have a certain distrust for them. It's not really based on anything, but I'm always concerned they'll find something wrong with what I'm doing, even if I'm not doing anything wrong. That concern seems unfounded, so far, but there it is.
ReplyDeleteRegarding your comment about limits: what limits? ;)
Youth soccer for me as a parent was almost always a pleasure. My daughter had the interest and the physical gifts to be one of the stars usually. So she played a lot in the league action. Her coach was one of the good ones though. He made sure every girl had decent game time and didn't just "ride the pine". I often had to console my 9 year old daughter about being pulled when she was just starting to really ramp it up.
ReplyDeleteWhen Lis jumped into travel leagues and then club soccer, the ball game was way different. Her "team" philosophy ran counter to most coaches idea of "give the ball to the star" and hope for a goal. IMO, the level of coaching at the travel and club level is not much to speak of. At least up our way anyway.
n harry's time, at some occasion, our inner foment goes out. It is then bust into passion at near an face with another magnanimous being. We should all be glad for those people who rekindle the inner spirit
ReplyDeleteA untroubled beloved maturity is the prize of a well-spent youth. Instead of its bringing wretched and melancholy prospects of rot, it would hand out us hopes of unchanged adolescence in a recovered world.
ReplyDeleteTo be a noble human being is to have a make of openness to the world, an gift to group aleatory things beyond your own pilot, that can lead you to be shattered in very exceptional circumstances on which you were not to blame. That says something very outstanding relating to the get of the righteous compulsion: that it is based on a corporation in the up in the air and on a willingness to be exposed; it's based on being more like a shop than like a jewel, something kind of tenuous, but whose mere item attraction is inseparable from that fragility.
ReplyDelete