Girl's Weekend - Part II

We're at it again!

Ellie and I had fun today getting out and being girls! We shopped, stopped at Michael's for Make It and Take It, Barnes and Noble to read some books and then onto Five Guys (Ellie's favorite!) to split a burger for lunch.

Hot Fun in the Pool !!

This is a short video of Ellie enjoying her pool!

Swimming Pool !!!

On a hot Saturday morning Bill blew up and filled the BIG pool for the yard. Temps have been over 100 .. and I love when they say, "but it will feel like 110!" "Relief in sight for tomorrow, high of 98!" We're doing our best to stay cool!

Field Trip to the Charlottesville Discovery Museum

Ellie's pre-school made a field trip to The Discovery Museum today on the Downtown Mall. I went as a parent chaperone .. and Ellie was so excited when I got to school. The museum is only a short walk away, and I was able to walk between both Ellie and Ellynor. We had lots of fun!

Short Pump for Shopping

After our normal Sunday morning routine decided to drive to Short Pump to experience the shopping everyone talks about. It's about 15 minutes before you get to Richmond, so about 55 minutes from our house - door to door. They boast the Short Pump Mall and lots of outlet-type plazas. I've never seen a bigger Barnes and Noble, Dick's Sporting Goods or Whole Food Market. Our first stop was REI Recreational Gear to complete our search for a good waterproof bag to carry at Disney. And then we had fun experiencing the outdoor mall of lots of new shops. Although it was pretty hot and steamy, we took our time and the stroller to enjoy the day. Ellie's favorite part was throwing coins in the fountain ... and one particular fountain had 'water pumps' which she really enjoyed!

Ice Cream on a Hot Summer Night

As a 'special treat' on Saturday night after Ellie had a terrific dinner of salmon, couscous and sauted greens (spinach and arugala) we decided to take a ride. We have a Kohr Brothers Ice Cream here in town. As you can see Ellie enjoyed the petite chocolate cone with rainbow sprinkles!

Ellie's Wisdom in Finding a Husband

Ellie & I were driving to pre-school yesterday when a story came on the radio about a woman who's had a 'boyfriend' for 25 years. When the DJ asked why would you possibly do that? The woman responded that he was still married to someone else! After I gasped, Ellie said, "Mommy what's wrong?"

I took this opportunity to say to her, "Ellie, don't choose a man with a wife or a girlfriend. If he's not smart enough to know you're the only one, he's not the one for you! You'll know you've found the right one when he's kind and smart."

Very satisfied I glanced into the rearview mirror to catch Ellie saying to me, "... and BRAVE, Mommy. Oh, and a good cooker too."

When I welled up with tears at the wisdom of this 4-year old, I reached for a tissue behind the passenger seat. Ellie sat with her arm over her eyes, "Mommy can I have a tissue too?" I asked her why she was crying and she told me that she missed Matthew Behm who was on vacation with his family and 2 year old sister Allison this week. Hmmm......

I thought the lessons for the day were over until our drive home. From the backseat, "Mommy, I'm not going to marry Matthew Behm anymore." Why not I asked. "Because I'm going to marry Watts now. He makes me laugh."

If I hadn't started to laugh myself I'd have been crying again. This wonderful child has all the wisdom at 4 it took me 34 years to learn. If only I'd known to hold out for a kind, smart, good cook and great sense of humor guy that I finally found in Bill. As Ellie would say, "Daddy is not a good singer, but he's a great man."

Remembering "The Boss"

The Boss, My First One
A Yankees bat boy remembers George Steinbrenner.

By Matthew McGough - Posted Tuesday, July 13, 2010 10:58 PM

The George Steinbrenner I remember from childhood was a villain as dastardly as any I'd ever encountered in pro wrestling or comic books. Having been born in 1975, I am too young to remember the Yankees' championship teams of my early childhood. I started paying close attention in 1983, Don Mattingly's rookie year, an otherwise mediocre season in a decade full of them. To come of age as a Yankees fan in the mid-1980s was to feel as if Mattingly was all we had. Donnie Baseball could do no wrong, and as an adolescent I could not fathom why this George Steinbrenner guy would go so far out of his way to persecute him.

When I got older and began reading the sports page, my distrust of the Yankees' owner deepened. Threats to move the team to New Jersey, threats to fire whoever happened to be the manager that week, threats to send this or that player to Columbus—what kind of man treated his fans and players this way? What happened next—Steinbrenner's suspension in 1990 for paying a gambler to dig up dirt on Dave Winfield—was no easier for a kid to understand. While I was hazy on most of the details, I was not too young to realize this was an embarrassment to the Yankees. Still, I followed the team as closely as ever. After the following season, on a bit of a lark, I began writing letters to the Yankees front office asking how to become a bat boy. A few months later, rather miraculously, I was hired to work in the home clubhouse.

Steinbrenner was still suspended in 1992, my first of two seasons with the team, but his specter haunted the clubhouse. The more veteran bat boys told tales of epic blowups of years past. I bore witness, by contrast, to an awkward, earnest pre-game clubhouse pep talk delivered by Joseph Molloy, the Steinbrenner son-in-law who was appointed Yankees' managing general partner in the Boss' absence. Molloy went on to become a middle-school gym teacher in Tampa, Fla., which seems a much better fit for his rhetorical skills. The Yankees, I realized, were used to fire and brimstone. I still had never met the man, but as the team limped to a fourth-place finish, it was hard not to wonder whether Steinbrenner's absence was partly to blame.

When Steinbrenner was reinstated in March 1993, he retook the helm in typically bombastic fashion. Inside the clubhouse, the changes were swift. The Boss had apparently spent part of his time away from baseball in consultation with nutritionists from the U.S. Olympic Committee. Forthwith, we were informed by the Yankees' head trainer Gene Monahan, we were strictly forbidden from going on pre-game fast food runs for the ballplayers, who were now expected to eat only the skinned chicken breasts and leafy salads prescribed by Steinbrenner himself. No bat boy needed to ask what the penalty would be if the Boss caught you delivering fried chicken from Cuchifritos or, God forbid, an Egg McMuffin. I'm not sure who took the news harder, the players or the bat boys—food runs were easily our most reliable source of tips. Eventually, as with any other unpopular edict, the banned conduct was merely driven underground. We developed a code to signal when Steinbrenner was up from Tampa and food runs were to be undertaken with elevated levels of stealth and caution. If "Elvis was in the house," the Big Macs were to be delivered to the team's weight room, a place the Boss was unlikely to conduct a spot check.

In the end, the Steinbrenner tantrums we all feared turned out to be infrequent and mild, especially compared to the bat-splintering ones of which the ballplayers proved capable. Still, given the stories I'd heard all my life, it was hard not to fear that any interaction with the man—however casual or careless—might end with the unceremonious termination of my dream job. I remember the morning of a day game when Steinbrenner unexpectedly walked into the clubhouse players' lounge much earlier than he usually appeared. I was eating cereal for breakfast and reading the Post; another bat boy named Silverio was laid out on one of the couches, watching television. I saw Steinbrenner come in, but Silverio did not. I tried to warn him, but Silverio was too busy flipping channels to notice. As I hurriedly stood and set to alphabetizing the newspapers and buffing already-clean tables, I watched with terror as Steinbrenner walked up behind Silverio. By the time my fellow bat boy saw him, it was too late. The Boss was standing right over him.

"Hiya, George," Silverio ventured. Bold move. Not how I would have played it. I waited for the eruption.

"Are you comfortable?" Steinbrenner asked him, a trace of sarcasm in his voice. "Can I get you anything? Anything at all?"

"Nah," said Silverio guardedly. "I'm fine."

I couldn't believe what I was witnessing, and what I was sure I was about to witness. It was like watching a car crash in slow motion. I wanted to help Silverio, but I couldn't. The Boss was going to can him on the spot.

"You sure?" Steinbrenner asked, giving him what seemed to be a final chance. Silverio reflected a moment.

"Yeah," he said. "Thanks, George."

Surely Silverio will not survive this, I thought. But after a long moment standing over him, the Boss just turned and walked out. I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, but it never did. I wonder whether Silverio would have been so lucky if Steinbrenner had caught him lying down after a tough loss. And perhaps a pre-Napoleonic Steinbrenner wouldn't have been so compassionate; countless other employees of the team through the years never received such mercy. But what happened that day reflected the Boss I knew: unpredictable, much feared, and mostly benign.

In April of the 1993 season, my senior year of high school, I started hearing back from the colleges where I'd applied the previous fall. The best school I was admitted to was Williams College, which I learned only then was Steinbrenner's alma mater. When it seemed as if my parents would not be able to afford the steep tuition—even then, nearly $30,000 a year—someone in the front office suggested I write a letter to the Boss asking for help paying for books and lab fees. I wrote the letter, not really expecting much from this man whom I had never spoken to and regarded with a great deal of apprehension, as any teenage Yankee fan and grateful employee might.

A few weeks later, the team's equipment manager Nick Priore told me I was wanted upstairs, in the team's front office. I had never been summoned there before.

"Did Nick tell you why I called you up here?" the Yankees' general counsel asked.

"No," I said.

"Well," he said, "Mr. Steinbrenner received your letter, and the Yankees Foundation has decided to give you a $10,000 scholarship for your first year of college." My mom cried when I called to tell her the news.

The next time I saw Steinbrenner was in the clubhouse a few weeks later. I summoned up the courage to interrupt him as he conducted one of his purposeful walks around the clubhouse. "Boss," I blurted. "I'm Matt, the bat boy you gave the scholarship to, to Williams. I just wanted to thank you." He stopped and reached out and gripped my shoulders tightly with both hands. "I never could have gotten in there today," he told me. After a moment he slapped me on the back and walked away.

Incredibly, the Boss repeated his gift of $10,000 for my sophomore year as well. After I graduated, he sent my father a letter in which he congratulated my parents and wished me all the best. The obituaries and eulogies in the coming days will make note of Steinbrenner's volatility and obsession with winning. Generations of fans will remember him as a legendary owner who changed the way sports franchises are run. As for me, I will always be in his debt.

Matthew McGough is a screenwriter and the author of Bat Boy: Coming of Age with the New York Yankees. His Web site is http://matthewmcgough.com/.

Article URL: http://www.slate.com/id/2260364/

Weekend at the Beach

Ellie (4) & Lucas(5) holding hands on the way to the beach


The dinner crew Lori, Craig, BJ, Bill, me and Milissa


Bill & Jake


Ellie, Sydney, Lucas, Madeline, Jake & Adam


BJ, Craig and Bill

We had a great time this weekend going to BJ and Lori's on the bay in Norfolk on Friday night, and then on to Sandbridge on Saturday into Sunday. Six adults, six children ... all got along famously!

The grown ups enjoyed a wonderful dinner out on Friday night at Byrd and Baldwin in downtown Norfolk. We had the $30 per person Friday Night Restaurant Week menu ... Bill and I both had salad and Filet for dinner .. the table ordered a variety of treats to share before dinner ..Fresh Hawaiian Ahi Tuna Tartare, Byrd & Baldwin Bros. Oysters Rockefeller, and Colossal Shrimp Cocktail. They were amazing! And dessert was wonderful creme brulee, mexican chocolate mousse and NY style cheesecake. My favorite part was sharing my favorite wine with the table .. Orin Swift The Prisioner, and it too was a hit!

Saturday was 'moving day' as we packed up the house ... after a breakfast of bagels, mini-muffins and coffee .. and made our way to the beach. Milissa and Craig's house had a pool so all the kids enjoyed an evening swim (showers in the afternoon put a bit of a damper on things!).

Sunday we spent time on the beach in Sandbridge before making our way home. What a wonderful weekend enjoyed by all!

Fireworks on the 4th of July

Ellie and Jessica (who is in Ms. Cook's classroom at ABC.)

Traditional Blueberry Tea Cake made every 4th of July with fresh blueberries!

Ellie, Jessica and her little brother Ben waiting for the fireworks

Laying on the blanket, losing interest and patience!

As we waiting for the sun to set from the top of Pantops mountain

We decided to get Ellie ready for the Fireworks at Disney by making sure we got to the Fireworks here in Charlottesville. They have a big display at MacIntyre Park. But after second thought, we decided the exiting could be a nightmare. So we had heard that lots of people gathered at Pantops in the parking lots ... and that's just wha we did. We brought chairs, a cooler and bubbles as we waited for the fireworks to start. Of course, Ellie found friends she knew right away! It was a great display, and the first time I've ever witnessed 6 different fireworks displays at different locations at the same time ... since we were to high up, we saw many other displays in the distance! And as the sun went down, there was a bit of a breeze and it was extremely comfortable to enjoy the show!

Peaches at the Orchard

Eating Peach Cider donuts! They're as good as apple cider donuts for sure!!

Enjoying her first fresh peach of the season!

Ellie & I enjoying the day at the orchard ... could have sat there all day!

Learning more about peaches and how they grow ...

Learning about the bees .. and all the unknown facts around them ...


In this gorgeous 80 degree, no humidity weather we wandered into Crozet to Chiles Peach Orchard for some fresh picked peaches and nectarines. This is where we picked strawberries on Mother's Day. The place was not jammed, but lots of peaches, peach cider, peach donuts, peach ice cream and other treats filled the place!

Red, White & Blue Day at School