Since the book discussion group was meeting today, our librarian decided to have the library open.

It was beautiful and sunny on the way going in, with a strong crosswind slightly in my favor. I went for speed, and I think I may have shaved a couple minutes off my best time. (Note: there is absolutely NO relationship between the erratic church clock in Seymour, my clock at home, or the time I think I actually left, but I like to pretend there is.)

When it was time to go home, the wind had shifted to a powerful dead-on headwind, and the highway was lousy with Saturday traffic. So I plotted out a leisurely 20-mile route home through country roads instead, going through the neighboring small towns of Nichols and Navarino. I planned to stop at a convenience store I believed was in Nichols for a sandwich and pit stop, but on the way into town I passed a park, and a tavern-league baseball game was going on, with a concession stand...and coincidentally, the Nichols team was playing the Hofa Park (my home) team. So I sat in the bleachers eating a hamburger and watched five innings.*

At that point my tolerance level for bad baseball had been reached, and some serious rain clouds were blowing in (and Hofa Park had lost their 3-run lead) so I headed out again. About a mile out of town the rain hit me, and I got on my jacket. It rained for about 10 minutes or so. I saw some of the worst roads and best scenery I've seen all year on the way home.


(*My, how local baseball has changed since I was a child. Everyone on the field was a young, fit, attractive 18-25-year-old. I remember going to the local games as a kid, and the players were all in their 30's and 40's, and most of them had beer guts which suggested that the team was about to give birth to a pack of full-grown Rottweilers. There was only one guy on the team who was in good shape, and all the women used to scream when he came up to bat. )