Quick Update

I haven't had a lot of time to write lately. Nothing really major going on. Just a lot of mundane busy-ness. But I thought it might be time for a quick check-in.

Work hasn't really improved much since this post, although there was a marked improvement in my position with the Probation Officers Advisory Board. I can't remember if I've written about the Advisory Board in the past, but in a nutshell, it's about two dozen probation officers from around the state who meet quarterly to discuss, plan, and orchestrate matters relevant to the field of probation in Indiana. I look at it as something rather prestigious. It can be an elected position, or a PO can be appointed by the Chief Justice of the Indiana Supreme Court. You can only be elected to two consecutive terms. I just began my second term after running unopposed again. I had been experiencing some frustrations on the Advisory Board during my first term, but things took a positive turn in May, as I wrote about here. I was assigned to a new committee, and July 14 was my first meeting with that new committee. Without boring you with meaningless details, I like my new committee roughly 42 gazillion times better than my old committee. So that was a positive.

I returned to the Indiana Judicial Center a week later, this past Wednesday, to teach new probation officers about the intrastate transfer policy--the procedure for transferring probation supervision from one county to another within Indiana. I think it went pretty well. I enjoy passing along information I've picked up over the past 13 years to the newbies.

I return to the Judicial Center this week for another meeting. It's a study group I'm part of by way of the Advisory Board. We're studying the future of probation in Indiana. Maybe I should just set up a satellite office in the Judicial Center's building.

Probationer-wise, nothing has changed. In fact, I was assigned a case on Tuesday the 21st. Young lady got a Conditional Discharge on a Possession of Marijuana case. A Conditional Discharge is a lot like probation, except that when she completes her period of probation, the entire charge is actually dismissed. I didn't get a chance to run her criminal history until Thursday the 23rd. And what did I find? A new arrest on Wednesday the 22nd for Domestic Battery in another county. I'm still waiting on the arrest report from the new offense, but if she made it 24 hours before violating, it was just barely 24 hours. So probationer-wise, nothing has changed.

As I wrote about here, I e-mailed the guy who runs a local softball park that I wanted to be a free agent. Over two weeks later, I haven't heard a peep from him. Not even a "I got your e-mail, and I'll let you know as soon as something comes up." Just dead silence. Very nice. So I haven't set foot on a softball field yet, and I'm not very happy about it. Chuck, hearing of my desire to unretire, is trying to put a team together at a different park in our neck of the woods. Problem is, the only night they offer softball there is the night that Olivia has gymnastics. We'd have to sign up by July 31, and the schedule for the next session of Olivia's gymnastics should be out at anytime, so I'm hoping that Olivia's instructor will have a class on a different day or something, so I can play softball. But if not, Olivia wins out without a second thought. Parents sacrifice for their kids, not the other way around.

Speaking of Chuck and softball, he and I just discovered yesterday that we actually met each other a couple years before we became friends. It seems we played against each other in softball! More specifically, I accidentally lined a pitch he tossed to me right back at his head. Fortunately, he caught it (more out of instinctual self-defense than softball skill) and avoided injury, but we both remembered the line drive. The more we talked, the more we put all the pieces together of playing against each other. We were both complaining about playing in Recreational leagues, but that most of the other teams would get players that were obviously far superior athletes, and then play in Rec leagues for some reason. We both mentioned that there was only one other team in the league that was at our skill level. We both remembered playing a see-saw battle that ended with only a run or two difference in score--quite different from the normal 416-0 beatdowns our teams would normally take each week. We both remembered cutting up with the other team throughout the game and having a genuinely good time. We both remembered exchanging phone numbers after the game and suggesting that we just get together every Sunday at a local park and play against each other, which would be more fun than getting bashed every week in the "official" softball league. Chuck told me his team's name--Just For Fun--and that they wore tie-dyed shirts for half the season and Sherman Williams t-shirts the other half of the season, and it all clicked. I remembered nearly decapitating the pitcher with the unintentional line drive, and Chuck yelled out, "I WAS THAT PITCHER!!" Funny!

The clover in my lawn that I've been trying to kill for a month is starting to get a little brown around the edges after the third application of poison I've put down. Holy crap. I think this clover is on steroids.

I enjoyed a day at the Little League park yesterday, watching Chuck's son play a double-header in a tournament. They got pretty thoroughly trounced in their first game, but they won their second game--against a different team--in convincing fashion. Chuck's son had some nice hits, drove in a few runs, and scored a few runs. One kid on our team hit one out of the park, and another hit it out of the park with the bases loaded--a grand slam! That was pretty exciting! The weather, after a rough morning filled with thunderstorms and rain, was absolutely perfect for baseball. It was a good day.

I picked my ten keepers in my dynasty fantasy football league. The draft in that league is Wednesday night, so I need to get ready for that.

Chuck fixed the belt on my lawnmower. It was the right belt. It's nice to have self-propulsion back.

My dad forwarded me a bunch of e-mails about some family history dating back to the late 1770's. That was REALLY cool! There is some interesting history there. One of the most intriguing stories for me is about a relative who, back in the 1800's, was on the run after killing a cousin. He met his fate at the hands of his brother-in-law, though. Nothing like a little family justice. It absolutely fascinates me to learn about family history so far back in time. The Mrs., not sharing my interest in genealogy, just kind of looks at me funny. I was telling her, at the same time I learned it myself, "Hey! Some of my family were Mormons back in the 1800's!" The Mrs. asked why that was important to me. "I don't know," I told her. "It's just interesting." She asked why. I told her that it's just something I didn't know before. She asked why that would excite me like that, to cause me to blurt it out. Then we just looked at each other like we thought each other was out of their minds. The Mrs. did mention, though, that her mom is doing some genealogy stuff on her side of the family, so maybe my mother-in-law will understand my excitement.

Well, so much for this being a "quick" update. It's time for me to use my newly-repaired self-propelled mower to chop down some of this clover-on-steroids.