Occasionally you see a great team riddled with injury, and that pretty much describes our team at this time. Tonight we played Heritage Christian High School for both JV and Varsity games, and though we didn’t win, surviving the night was a pretty impressive feat in itself. We only lost 6-5. Heritage was ranked #1 in the state going into the game, and we knew it would be tough. We were already heavily adapting to compensate for illness and injury going in, but it seemed as the whistle started the game, so did the line of girls coming off to see the trainer. We lost one girl completely to what was possibly a broken hand, (x-rays showed it wasn’t) and the others kept the ice bags flowing all night along our bench.

We really were not playing that well, all things considered, but seemed to be able to keep up. Tomorrow we play two again, but this time it is our home opener against Concord High School, and our last game until after Spring Break! Our goal is to get through tomorrow and allow the team a full two weeks to get healthy again. We have every reason to believe that we will actually be at full strength for the first time all season for our game on April 12th.

God Bless these girls. They are pretty tough. On the sideline the injured ones would suddenly appear and let us know not just that they could go back in, but they wanted to go back in. You can’t teach heart, but I can see that we have it. Losing to #1 while limping along was hard on them, but not the end of the world….one game at a time. They see the big picture, and are a great team. I am proud to be their coach!

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+

Oh though I am tempted to post the logo of my beloved Butler Bulldogs AGAIN (yes, I indeed did graduate from Butler back in the 1800’s), I have decided instead to post a picture taken tonight of Ben and his grandma who is here to visit (though she SAYS all of us) him.

Unlike many son-in-law/mother-in-law relationships, we get along marvelously. She stayed up to see most of the Butler win, and I have to say I was very pleased at how happy she was. I did not fail however to note that she was wearing that Kansas State t-shirt, and if they happen to beat Xavier tonight, KSU will become our next victim….so I am praying the honeymoon continues. Although if KSU wins, I am not sure how either of us will survive! I mean really….how will I ever be able to help her with that KSU loss depression when I will be so elated…overjoyed in fact. Thank God for Ben I suppose. He will be my plan to distract her from yet another Butler surgical extraction of a great team from the NCAA brackets!

But I should not gloat. One thing that I will admit is that I am a loyal fan. I cheer for the Bulldogs when they are at the top AND at the bottom, and I am a die hard Cubs and Bears fan as well. If I live many years and this blog goes on as well, at this time of year I’d expect I will be desperately searching for a topic, as most of the time the teams I root for suck, although that is probably not as descriptive as it should be. So let me just say I will enjoy it while I can and leave it at that. I want to shout it from the rooftops, but alas, from them we swiftly fall. I will just enjoy it for what it is…..God’s Chosen Team spanking all the evil doers. After all, who am I to contradict prophesy…..?

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+
(BA in Religion 1984 – Butler University…..the ones who just knocked off the Orangemen!)

Yep, it took Ben just shy of three years before he could dunk, whereas I am just shy of 49 and still have a 3/4 inch vertical leap. That’s what all my kids love about me…..I set the bar pretty low.

But Ben and I were out in the driveway playing basketball and soccer tonight, obviously in the dark. Playing any kind of “game” with a 2 year old is a blast, as long as you are not concerned with anything like “rules.” He made everything up as we went along, yet there was one consistent theme…..make dad do all the work. At my age it is quite suspicious, seeing as he seems to work for my wife and they both would benefit from my demise. It seems much more brilliant than poison! But at least I will go having a great time.

It reminded me of all the times I played with Steph and Scott, and often with the same unfair and made up rules. There were times that I wondered if either of them would learn to do anything really athletic, but in time they were beating me in driveway sports and have turned out to be athletes in their own right.

Perhaps I should see that there is hope for even a 2 year old….of course I’ll probably never see it. At the way he cheats and has me running I expect I will be in heaven before he is even 5!

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+

Tonight the Lady Millers Lacrosse Team took the field at Covenant Christian High School for our season opener. It begins my third year as the Head Coach, and it is looking to be an exciting year. We played very well from beginning to end, and every single player was able to take part in a 17 – 2 victory!

Of course there are a ton of games to go, and I learned a long time ago, first as an athlete and now as a coach, that you take one game at a time. Tonight was a Varsity game only, but by the end of Saturday night we will have played 4 additional games, 2 Varsity and 2 JV. And from there it will be a constant blur of games until the State Finals on May 23rd. We, like every team in the state, hope to be there.

But it was great to finally get here. The last time we were scheduled on the Covenant Field I was our season opener in 2008. I was in the hospital following my stroke, and one of our assistants and two of our men’s team coaches guided the team to a victory. I thought about that a lot tonight…..how thankful I have been and am for the support of many friends, and how thankful I am to the Lord for the opportunity to walk out onto that field myself.

Everyday is indeed a gift, and I am blessed with each one of them. Win or lose, it is a privilege to live this life. I thank God for today, and if it is His Will to let me see tomorrow, I will thank Him for that as well!

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+

It is good to be a dog…..at least it is good to be Viper. Though all of us were scrambling to keep up with the day, Viper spent the day at the “spa” so they say. He got a bath, a grooming, lots of attention, and then some treats. To make matters even more pathetic, Amanda made sure he got a new dog bed to boot. I guess being all gussied up in no good if you have to sleep on the clean carpet in the house.

The sad reality is that Viper couldn’t care or not whether he was in a dog bed or not. If it were a bed of nails, he would be on his back with all four feet in the air snoring. He is a smart boy though. He has been on this new bed a lot, particularly when Amanda has been walking by. He knows which side his biscuits are buttered on, (to force a cheesy expression into the dog world) and he has been exploiting it all night long. I am thinking he likes the days she emerges from migraines…..she is a little loopy and much easier to deal with if you are a shedder…..not a problem I have with my military style haircuts.

So it is off to bed for us both. Me on my old well worn mattress and Viper on the Royal Pillow. I hold no grudges against him though. I would not mind be spoiled a bit myself.

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+

I was scheduled to be out of town today, in Fort Wayne in fact, to join the Bishop with two of our congregations up there and to visit with a few candidates for ordination. Sadly, it was a day with an agenda that just wasn’t meant to be.

At 5am, as I was getting ready to leave, Amanda shared with me that she was getting a migraine and that she had already had the lower does of the medicines we keep here to stave them off, but that she wanted me to get the rest. She told me she thought I should still go to Fort Wayne, but this was not my first rodeo. She rarely takes the full home dose, and these times often turn into trips to the ER for shots. PLUS, we live in a house with a 2 YEAR OLD. She was already complaining about the light and the noise (when neither were that bad) so I made the decision right then to stay home. I still had to wait a few hours before notifying anyone in Fort Wayne because they were still sleeping, but the blessing was that I was already scheduled up north so there wouldn’t need to be any reshuffling down here. All our churches were already covered.

So the day has been quite odd. Ben and I have spent the entire day together and his energy would have done his mom in, (and had I left me, via homicide when I got home) but we have had a good day. There was no milk here, so I was able to take him on a late morning trip to the Kroger. I learned a few things too, such as everyone shops on Sunday morning at Kroger…..so I may be planting a church there. But we did get what we need and Ben has eaten and worn a LOT of sugar free pudding and other things to keep his mind off his mom sleeping upstairs.

And Amanda never did need the shot, and she did come down for maybe 15 minutes and ate before disappearing upstairs. Being awake 15 minutes in 24+ hours may seem a bit worrisome to most, but to people in the families of migraine sufferers, we all know that is means she will probably be back among the living tomorrow! She will be slow, but moving.

The good part is that we have all survived the day. Praise God, it is almost over too!

Goodnight to you all my friends and God Bless.

Tommy+

Although I did not have a chance to see either of the first two games, I was able to see and hear just part of this afternoon’s 2nd round game where my beloved Butler Bulldogs beat the Murray State Murrays…..or is it Murrae? I was never any good at languages. (Actually I was an athlete, so I was able to test out of Greek and Hebrew by mowing the coach’s lawn….but I digress.)

What bothers me VERY MUCH is the fact that I tuned into the game with 2:21 left and down by 3! I used to get all juiced up by the close ones, but you know now at 48 I can do without them. All the ads for men my age are about Viagra and Rogaine. “Make sure your heart is healthy enough for sex or can hold a comb over your head without fainting.” But they ought to add, just sit on the porch and a few hours after it is over we’ll come tell you how they did. In truth, though I may think my heart is healthy enough to handle it, I could feel it in my chest. Why when I coach close games I never get chest pain or anxiety, but put a team of guys I have never met on the floor playing for my Alma Mater and I apparently can turn it into a cardiac event.

I suppose I shouldn’t worry. In just a few weeks we will be National Champions and I will probably be on a LOT of Prozac and in rehab. But if March Madness wasn’t maddening, then it wouldn’t be March in Indiana.

Keep me in your prayers, as well as all Butler fans (including Jesus and all the angels, Archangels and such….Butler is BIG in heaven). We are going to need it.

Off to take my pulse!

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+

With lacrosse season kicking off, I get to see all of Stephanie’s games since I am the coach, but very few of Scott’s. I was able to see him play last night, but I will miss tomorrow and many of his others because of my schedule. It makes me sad sometimes. Ideally you would love to be at everything for all your kids, but I can only do my best. At just three months shy of 49 today, I can say without hesitation, it will be easier with Ben. Someone will just come up to me at the nursing home and tell me over my pureed dinner how I enjoyed the game, to which I will probably reply, “Ben who?” No no no….I will be there for games even then, and by that time games of grandchildren as well.

But today is really a day for celebration as well. This afternoon we were able to tour a church in downtown Indianapolis that I think we may be able to plant a new congregation in! It was a pretty exciting time today! The people we spoke to were so very wonderful, and we just pray that it will all work out. We have yet to plant a church inside Indianapolis proper, just all around it. This would be a major thing for us all!

But as for us tonight, I think I will sing a few upbeat songs to the dog and move him away from the dump truck. It was a great photo op, but Goldens are supposed to be happy, and he needs to be. I will sing his favorite song which is a remake of “How much is that doggy in the window?” It is called, “How much is that kitty in the window? Oh wait, who cares!” It was recorded my Shaggy and the Milkbones in the late 1970’s. He loves it, and who am I to deny him? So it’s off to sing!

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!

Tommy+

Wow…..it was the best of days, it was the worst of days. I was upset with a bit of binge eating and since I was not at home today ALL DAY I continued to eat out of convenience rather than being able to get to what I needed to eat. It upsets me, but you cannot cry over spilled milk as they say. I can only control what I am doing now and in the future. I will have a good few days.

After practice this afternoon Ben and I headed down to Heritage Christian where our boy’s team was playing tonight. We won both games and Scott had a goal and a couple of assists in his, and it was a good time.

Of course I was there with a 2 year old, and that’s why we say apart and really had one full set of bleachers to ourselves. (The others were full of fans.) The players of mine that were there all said hi to Ben and I, yet I noticed none of them stayed with us, nor did any offer to entertain either Ben or I……smart girls, very smart. It is pretty awesome to see our boy’s and girl’s teams out supporting each other. Sure, some of them have to because they are dating, but generally they like to come to each others’ games.

But we were off by ourselves (in the next set of bleachers) drinking (Diet Soda) in isolation. People could watch the game without all the screaming and running, and we were able to see the game and play like maniacs. It was a lot of fun.

So the boy’s are into the games that count and we open on Tuesday, like them, away. We will take the same field on Friday night against Heritage and hope to fare as well. It is a great program, and what I like about many of our schools, we coaches are friends and actually, our girls are friends too. It will be an exciting evening.

So it is off to bed for me before I turn into whatever something this old turns into when it has done too much in a day. Ben has just had a bath and is talking a mile a minute……I hope he gives it up. I am clearly not too long for this night!

Goodnight my friends and God Bless.

Tommy+

I really had a great day with my diet and was looking forward to weighing myself in the morning. I had anticipated breaking the 220 mark, which is huge for me, but instead I let the stress of the day call me down a bad path. It is an awful thing too. You know that you are doing it, but you have very little self-control. I will both weigh in AND post tomorrow. I just hope the damage is not too severe. I took this picture of myself in an attempt to share with others just how hard it is….obviously I look like hell.

I just need to get a grip I suppose. When I was an athlete, I worked through every problem. Now I seem to just make excuses and it is frustrating……I have seen the enemy and it is me! I have three weeks to go and clearly I will not make it unless I eat NOTHING ELSE and exercise the entire time. But the battle is not a time line, it is larger than that. I need to win the war and for good!

Anyway, I appreciate your prayers and support. I would like to be close to 200 by Easter. It would still be a big thing. But to get there I need to readjust…..and I am trying that now. Time will tell how I do, but despite my mistakes, I keep at it. I really do want to succeed.

Goodnight my friends and God Bless!
Tommy+