Victors Valiant

Michigan just won their first national championship in women's softball. They've been to the WCWS for the last several years, but never seemed to be able to break through and win anything, and I mean, a single game. Its really amazing, when you think about the fact that Michigan is the first team to win the WCWS from east of the Mississippi. The power, witnessed by UCLA having won 10 national titles (oddly enough, the same number of titles John Wooden won there) is on the west coast. Especially in California and Arizona. Michigan seemed to be playing a very different style of ball, relying much more on extra-base hits and home runs than on the typical slap-hitting and hyper-dominant pitching. Michigan's pitching is good too, but the strikeouts aren't nearly as high as some of the other teams and pitchers. But, wow, seeing them win a national championship, knowing that Carol Hutchins has been at Michigan for more than 20 years and essentially built the program by herself, is incredible. And making this especially poignant is that Michigan just lost former athletic director Don Canham, the man who's most responsible for making Michigan as well known across the country as it is, and for making it possible for Michigan Stadium to sell out for the last 20 years, who was the man who hired Hutchins, and helped make some of the less well known sports, like softball and swimming, a priority.

I also watched the latest Sports Kids episode, and things are kind of proceeding as I thought they might. The skating son and his mom's relationship seems to be frostier by the minute. The equestrian family is having to make the choice on whether to sell the horse or not. Now that was a lie. The mother is almost being forced to sell the horse because of her financial situation, and the daughter didn't even know that there were potential buyers for the horse were going to look at the horse at the farm she went to ride at for a weekend. The cheerleading mother seems to be, well, crazy, and seems to be totally overdoing her child, who does about 12 dance or cheerleading related activities, which even cuts into her school time, meaning things are a little screwed up in mom's head. They also showed Craig and Trenton going through a workout, which included Craig playing quarterback with Trenton as a receiver going against the personal trainer Trenton works with, attempting to score a touchdown. He didn't, and actually got hit pretty hard. But what really intrigued me was seeing Trenton and his mom, and Trenton was practicing an instrument, one that if he stays with, will assure him a job for the rest of his life. Yes, mothers of America, do the smart thing and make sure your children know how to play the electric bass. Smart move by Trenton's mom.

One last Tony observation. Who wasn't secretly rooting, after Bill Irwin won for actor in a play, and knowing that one of the other nominees was Billy Crudup, and that Mary-Louise Parker was nominated as an actress, that she would win. At which point she could, borrowing a classic turn of phrase from the Rock, take that Tony, shine it up real nice, and stick it straight up his two-timing, doesn't know how good he's got it, candy ass.

I had an extraordinarily long meeting last night, four and a half hours at a New Durham Planning Board meeting, so today has been about me being tired. We also had a little problem getting out The Baysider, because the publisher sent a different template after we had already sent it out, so Mary and Josh had to rework several pages.

Myself, Adam and Shannon, and the newest reporter at the Granite State News, Adam Coughlin, will be going to the Wolf Trap, which is a local bar, Friday night. We'll see how this goes, I'll keep everyone posted.