Thursday Thirteen (#16): Back to reality

It's back-to-school time, the craziest time of year for many of us. But I've discovered that back-to-school time is also back-to-everything else time as well: Back-to-soccer 1 As head coach of a U9 boys team, I've gotten back to soccer in a big way. Last weekend I got my "F" class coaching license from CYSA, and I look forward to every practice with the boys. They're great kids! The season begins September 8th. Back-to-soccer 2 This coming weekend is my over-30 men's soccer club's "Derby Day," when the four club teams all play each other and then barbecue to kick off the season. The actual season begins the first Sunday after Labor Day. Back-to-Cub Scouts The Cub Scout year aligns with the school year. Even though I'm not an official scout leader, I am backup and volunteer a lot. Both my boys love scouting, so we end up with a lot of events in September. Back-to-Campaign My job involves running the annual employee charitable giving campaign for one of the world's largest companies. We traditionally run the campaign from mid September to mid October, which means that all of July, August, and September are crazy busy for me (thus the dearth of good blog entries and the utter lack of any fiction production besides Fiction Friday). Back-to-football Go Bears! College football begins. This means much of my usable Saturday time is reserved for the much more important watching of football. Back-to-crossing guard Kids in school means kids in crosswalks. Once again I'll be out there keeping the wee ones safe on my lollipop duty while trying not to get run over. Don't laugh. I save one life a year at least and have nearly been run over (like, the kind where you actually die) twice. Back-to-darkness Now is the time of year you start to notice it getting darker during the morning commute. It sneaks up on you, but one day you realize you've had to put your headlights on a few days in a row, and it's not because of overcast skies. Back-to-grumpiness With all this work going on and everyone struggling to figure out their commute, school, and activity schedules, and with vacations being over (except for the payments on the VISA bills), people tend toward grumpiness. Maybe that's why they generally hold elections in November, so people have a whole month to build up their grumpiness. Back-to-netflix When I was a kid, I went to movies in the summer. Now, I wait until the fall and netflix them instead. I can't afford to take a family of four to all the movies I want to see during the summer. With theaters shrinking it's almost better seeing them on my big-screen TV anyway. Back-to-yardwork The summers here tend to be scorching. Now the weather begins to ease off a bit, and the weeds find this a charming time for a resurgence. Back-to-alarm clocks My 8-year-old hops out of bed every day at 6:45 a.m., all year long. My 11-year-old would sleep until 11 a.m. if he could. Every morning during the school year is a struggle to drag him out of bed and get him off to school. Back-to-memories Two years ago, my father-in-law passed away over the Labor Day weekend. We miss you, Gary. Back-to-reality Summer's a time for fun and swimming and vacations and travel and all that. September is when the harvest begins, when it's time to get serious and put away stores against the coming harsh winter. OK, maybe not in California but you get my drift. OK, everybody. Enough blogging. Back to work!

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