On Sunday evening, Lando declared that he wanted us to take him to the tennis courts next to Funshop (in Lincoln Park) so that we could play tennis. The high that day was 48°F. Strangely enough, we weren't especially eager to do this.
However, we would be going to Funshop on Monday to pick up the materials for the new session (which will begin on Feb 4), so I told him that we could play a bit of tennis then. True, it would be cold, but I knew that he would only want to play for about 5 minutes anyway.
I was wrong.
Worse than that, not only was it much colder (well below freezing) and dark, but we also had ice, snow, and wind to go with it. Perfect tennis weather!
I'm not sure how long we were out there, but it was at least 30 minutes, perhaps more. Long enough for Dawn to go inside the Funshop building, complete all of the necessary activities, then come back out and join us for a bit more tennis.
Lando plays tennis on our Nintendo Wii regularly. One of the activities involves hitting a tennis ball at a wall, so Lando wanted to be sure to do that. Incidentally, he's actually using a badminton racket, because he prefers it over (heavier) tennis rackets. Perhaps this will be a new trend in tennis!
One advantage to playing tennis at night in the middle of a snow/ice storm is that you don't have to wait for an open court. You have your choice of any of them. Or, if you prefer, all of them!
Lando originally was playing behind the backcourt, just like he's seen tennis players do on TV (and on the Wii). Luckily I was able to convince him that he was better off playing a little closer to the net.
"Lando, Mommy's frozen solid, so we should probably go home now."
There are so many things about this story that would never happen to our family, that it's a wonder we're related. You get extra Papa experience points for doing this though, you should go up a level soon.
Posted by: ross | 01/31/2010 at 10:15 AM
Wait! I don't want to go up a level, 'cuz then the DM will just make things even harder!
Posted by: Wally Hartshorn | 02/01/2010 at 02:07 PM
I just checked, but I couldn't find a GURPS Parenting expansion.
Posted by: Wally Hartshorn | 02/01/2010 at 02:08 PM