I Pickleballed, and Other Updates

Well. Pickleball is quite fun. We played on Friday night. Even though I wasn’t very good (I can’t help but hit the ball way too hard and it flies miles outside the line); and even though I ended up playing two games against a VERY condescending mansplainer while my husband monitored my response out of the corner of his eye, to see if he needed to rescue me. (I am a woman lawyer in the American South – tolerating mind-numbing mansplaining by old men is about 50% of my job. At least this guy actually knew more than I did about the topic of pickleball). So even with these two less-than-ideal circumstances, I had a blast, and I totally get why it is sweeping the nation. It’s a sort of tennis/ping pong hybrid designed for families that would have a mix of skill levels – the rules contain lots of concessions to the bad players/kids/Olds in the group. Allegedly, Pickles was the name of the dog belonging to one of the guys who invented it, hence the name. Anyhow. NOLA just opened an indoor Pickleball court that has a bar surrounded by lots of courts inside, plus a few outside. We went with our church group of people in their 40s and 50s, and it was amazingly fun. I had a gin and blackberry cocktail which was super yum and refreshing (and mostly soda, I like my cocktails watered down these hot summer days). We chatted and took turns playing. It was great.

Saturday we went swimming. Tulane closed its pool/natatorium all summer long to refinish the bottom, which makes sense in that the students are gone in summer and also was AWFUL because summer is when you need a pool! It just opened again and I took all three boys on Saturday while the Prof went to a luncheon in the Quarter. I was deeply annoyed as only ONE of these boys would put on a suit and swim. Liam sat on the side of the pool in his hoodie and long pants and read a book, and Jack went and played basketball on the other side of the Tulane rec center. I had fun in the pool with Craiggy boy but it took me a hot minute to get over my irritation at the other two. Saturday night we watched the Spider man movie streaming at home, and today we did church and the kids have lots of school year kickoff party type activities. I talked to a lot of people at a lot of places, which I’ve decided is an important weekend activity given most of my week is spent indoors at my house alone.