Hick Its Worsen Whirs

I thought that tennis this week would go better than tennis last week. After all, at least this time I remembered right away that if I don't keep my eye on the ball, I'll miss it every time. I was bound to be able to return at least a few serves; maybe we'd even be able to lob it back and forth 7 or 8 times.

I called D. to let her know when I arrived at the tennis court and to tell her that since there was no one else there yet, it was all ours (mwah-hah-hah). Then she gave me the news. There had been a small crisis when she'd tried to leave the house. For some reason, the canine members of her family (Dolly and Gypsy) were having none of it. Major fit-pitching...so D. brought them with her. I love those two dogs, so I didn't have a problem with this, especially since D. assured me that the dogs would very quickly get bored and go lie down in a corner. This was true for Dolly. Gypsy, on the other hand...

I guess the problem was that we were playing with Gypsy's tennis balls. We haven't bought any of our own, so D. brought some of Gypsy's. They're very friendly-looking (smiley faces on them), but Gypsy feels a sense of ownership towards them. We quickly discovered that if we wanted to hit the ball and forth, we really had to hustle because if Gypsy got there first, she would take the ball and run with it. Maybe she'd bring it back to you, and maybe she wouldn't. Maybe she'd put it somewhere on the sidelines. In any case, she'd get to chew on it. That brings us to the little matter of the spray.

It's what's been missing from my game. I tend to get overheated when playing tennis. No problem, says Gypsy. I'll just slobber all over the tennis balls so that when you hit one, a fine mist will gently descend upon your face.

Once we were good and sweaty, Dolly decided to get into the game. Have you ever tried to serve a tennis ball while a dog stands behind you, thoroughly licking all the sweat off your legs?

Also, we ran into D.' s mother and step-father, who were out walking their two dogs. No problem ordinarily, but Piper doesn't like D.'s dogs. Much barking. Actually, there'd been much barking throughout the neighborhood while we played. I wondered if all the dogs in a three-block radius could hear us yelling, "Go get the ball, Gypsy! Go get the ball!"

We accidentally hit one of the balls out of the court, and it landed in a bit of "nature." Now, D. assures me that it isn't actually "nature," and that the faint rustling sound I kept hearing was, in fact, a drainage ditch. This reassured me until we decided to go fetch the ball after our game. It was dark by this point, and I couldn't really see what kind of ground cover we were trodding through. What does poison ivy look like? I don't know, and neither does D., despite her camping experience. "It's shiny," she says. Great. And how do we tell if it's shiny in the dark? I got out of there as quickly as I could, and so far, so good. No rashes. Yet.

So now I'm just worried about West Nile.