Thanks for visiting tennisandtunes.com! This is where I talk about two of my passions, tennis and music, and any other thing I decide to rant about. Sit back, give a listen, have a laugh, and thanks again for stopping by.
So, yeah…it’s been a while since my last post. I go through phases where I like to talk alot, then sometimes I don’t want to say anything…obviously I haven’t wanted to say anything in a while. I did get some unexpected feedback from some of my tennis peeps asking what happened to my tennis vlogs….glad some folks other than Kels and my mom were watching
What have I been up to? Well, I started really playing guitar again and of course found it necessary to purchase a new gitfiddle. I sold one of my guitars to a buddy of mine and used that cash to help pay for the new one. I’d never played an ESP guitar but wow, this girl is awesome…here’s a pic:
She sings! And of course I just HAD to upgrade my amp, so I got a new Line6 POD X3 Pro! I’ve been playing some heavier tunes lately and I’m not sure if that will translate into writing heavier songs. It’s weird…like two sides of a coin…the music I write typically comes out on acoustic guitar and is a little more chilled out, but I also really like to jam…hehe. Guess we will see what happens.
On the tennis front, the Flower Mound 4.0 team I play on made the playoffs that were played in Arlington over the course of a weekend. We kicked some major arse on the first day, playing two different teams and winning easily. The second day was another story and we got crushed. I think we took 4th out of 16 teams…not bad, but wish we coulda done better. Here are a couple of pics from the playoffs:
Guess that’s it for now…I will do my best to get some more content up soon.
Ever have one of those days where whatever it is you normally love to do, you just don’t wanna do? Yesterday was like that for me and tennis. My USTA Team was scheduled to play Southlake and I woke up feeling grumpy, pouty, and I…DON’T…WANT IT!!! That’s how I’m feeling about the whole day…hehe. To quote a Lowen and Navarro song, I wanted to be the “opposite of everything”. Sometimes though, ya just gotta pull up your big boy panties and do what you gotta do. With that concept in mind, I head out to the courts.
Our Cap’n graciously chooses not to play today so that everyone on the team can get their chance to compete. I am playing the #1 doubles line with Steve…he’s a cool cat. We are waiting for our court assignments and Marc rolls up holding a big ass goose!…our new team mascot. I grabbed the iPhone to shoot some video but I guess user error prevailed and I missed it. That was a chilled out goose too…just kinda hung out with us while we waited. I tried to strike up a conversation with him, but turns out I don’t speak goose and English was not his first language.
Here is our pre-match vlog:
Steve and I won our weird match, 7-5, 4-6, and 10-6 in a third set tie breaker. We both kinda checked out mentally in the second set as we shoulda won in straights. We also won as a team sweeping all 5 matches a good day all in all. Still not sure why my energy was so funky…maybe it was lack of sleep, lack of proper body fuel, general malaise…I dunno. Was a total opposite from last weekend when I was charged up for the tourney Saturday and Sunday. Oh well…below is our post-match vlog…I had to do a little edit cuz in my candid recounting of the match cuz I used a non-pc phrase that is better to be left out…hehe.
Oh…and I promise to do better with my camera work. I get a little Blair Witchy sometimes.
Here are some sweet shots from the Flower Mound Open this past weekend taken by Lacy, my partner Jimmy’s wife. She was actually on the court during warm-ups snapping shots…very cool. Thanks Lacy!
Today’s final was played at 11:00 this morning…and yes, again…it was windy as balls! It wasn’t as bad as yesterday though cuz the guys we played against hit with good pace. And that’s the thing…after you’ve played at a certain level, it’s hard to adjust to slower ball speeds. Not taking anything away from our opponents yesterday, but we had more fun today cuz the guys could really hit the ball. Jimmy and I arrive at the courts and are warming up when the team arrived…a father and son team. The dad plays at the 5.0 level and his son plays high school tennis…both cool guys and really good players.
The first set started and finished in a flash. Jimmy and I were ON! As such…we took the first set 6-0. We were so on, that we decided to go OFF just as quickly and blew the second set 0-6…ouch! Now we are tied up with a set a piece. We decided to play another full set instead of the 10 point tie breaker like yesterday. We re-focused our game, started strong, and finished strong taking the set 6-2…victory!
Kels shot some cool vids and took some sweet pics, so I will cut the post short and post em below
So my boy Jimmy and I decide to enter the top division of the Flower Mound Open. We were scheduled to play at 1:30, but didn’t get on the court till 2:30 or so, due to a rain delay this morning. We got a first round bye and were able to do some scouting on the team we were scheduled to play. The theme of the day was…In Tennis, the wind is the great equalizer…and boy did we feel it today! 30mph gusts make for a match full of errors. It took us a good 4 or 5 games before we actually started to get a feel of what the wind was doing…and we all know what a fan I am of windy tennis days…ugh!
After we got our bearings, Jimmy and I started to groove a little bit. The team we played fought hard and were gracious, although there was a ‘moment’ in the first set where one of the guys hit a ball back over the net after the point was over…no problem except he hit it right at me! Woulda pegged me too if I wasn’t paying attention. He didn’t really mean to hit it at me and apologized…no harm done. We rolled to a 6-3, 6-3 victory, reported our scores, and waited for the next team to get to the courts. A 30 minute rest, a Powerbar for me and a Clif Bar for Jimmy and we were ready to go.
Both of the guys on the second team we played were really cool. Tommy is a guy on my USTA Team and he was playing with his son Josh. Josh is in the US Army and is home from Iraq…cool guy. Thanks to him and all members of the armed forces for putting in the hard miles so we can enjoy the lives we lead at home! On to the match…the wind magically disappeared…NO IT DIDN’T! It was in full force and wreaking havoc on mine and Jimmy’s rhythm. Despite that, we rolled the first set 6-2. Feeling good about things, we went into the second set hoping to close it out quick and grab an adult beverage to celebrate our win. Tommy and Josh didn’t think so. The won the second set in a close tie breaker 7-6. In this tournament, we aren’t playing a third set, but are playing a 10 point tie breaker for the match…first one to 10 and win by 2. We started off strong and didn’t let up…we won the tie breaker 10-4! Game, set, match!
During our earlier match, Jimmy’s wife, Lacy (hope I spelled that right) arrived, camera in hand, ready to grab some cool shots. Once I get some pics, I’ll post em. My girl made it out after she sang with her Dirty Rotten Scoundrels cast mates…was cool to hear them cheering for us!
Tomorrow, we play in the finals at 11:00! Tonight…I’m chillin. Had the spousal unit take a rolling pin to my calf muscles…OUCH!!! They were spazzing like crazy…Kels said it looked like my calves had Mexican jumping beans in em…hehe. Took some Ibuprofen (one of my best friends), lotsa water, Icy/Hot and recovery sleeves on my calves, iced my elbow, and downed some electrolyte tabs…a good night sleep and I’ll be ready to rock.
Here are a couple of vlogs from the day…enjoy my goofiness
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