Eagles vs. Cowboys!!!

I’d been looking forward to this game all week.   Out of town riding all weekend and I was primed for some balling!   Took a half day of work so I could get in a lift and some chores and get home with t.Human just in time to set the tivo on both TVs. 5:30pm is a challenge for a west coast fan!

Beckie was not going to be home til about 8, and I owed her and G some G-time after being away all weekend. The trick was going to be taking care of Genevieve and still getting to enjoy the flow of the game. When I tivo games its hard to maintain the tension and the drama of watching it live, and as I am more easily and willingly interrupted, I lose the flow even more. Mix in one tinyHuman, and this posed a problem that would require careful game planning, clock management, and personnel skills – as a veteran heckler and drinker in this league, there was no place for excuses, guys needed to step up!

The first quarter G ate, so we watched in the pool room together. And vacuumed up all the pork fried rice that she and Kila left on the floor. After about 5 minutes of digestion, and 5 minutes of self-distraction on the porch, she was ready to enter the game. We did some laps around the house, timed perfectly to coincide with TV-timeouts and commercials. But eventually G got wise to how we kept ending up in the Pool room, but all her stuffed animals were still scattered on the bed. We played a brief but intense games of 12347 on the bed, followed by more laps around the house – these worked for awhile until she again got frustrated with the interruptions to her plays. The irony…

Finally I paused both TVs for a marathon session of running, wrestling, tuggy and tickling. She started calling for the Laughing Game, something she must have picked up at daycare.

The game wore on, G needed a sub, and we spent the second half of the 2nd quarter sitting on the barstools. A bath at halftime, and finally she chilled watching her shows while I watched the 2nd half.

Its not quite fun for the whole family, but it worked out pretty well for the whole team (except Kila, who got screwed out of a run; laps around the house get dull for the dog after about 6 of them). I taught G to shout “YEAH EAGLES!!!!” She’s a big fan of the jumping up and down and celebrating part.