Volleyball mania!!!

OMG it's HERE!!!! It's finally here!! I love V-ball season!!

So I'm officiating high school volleyball again this year. :) Last year was my first year and although I was reffing mostly terribly painful Junior High games with a few JV and Varsity games thrown in the mix, I LOVED it! I didn't so much love finding blue slacks for the uniform (I searched EVERYWHERE! It's like they don't exist...) and I was physically exhausted by mid-November, but the extra cash made it all worth it. Last year that extra cash helped pay the security and pet deposits for the new house I was moving into. This year? Well, it SHOULD go to the CC debt... and some of it probably will. But I'm thinking I want to use some of it to pay for a trip to Turkey in Feb/Mar. :) We'll see. That's not quite set yet...

So last weekend (not this past weekend, but the weekend before) my 6'6" friend, Elaina, had a couple friends in town and we ended up playing a 4 hour long pickup game of volleyball on the grass court on Whitman's Ankeny Field. Granted, I'm only 5'7", but I was damn impressed that I actually kept up with them! My timing was off on my attack approach, and I can't jump for shit, but I notice that I always play better when I'm with people that are better than me. My serves and passes were good, and on occasion I got lucky and made a kill or two. I was extremely pleased. I hadn't played GOOD volleyball in so long that it was like a drug. I was euphoric for days... however, my body disagreed with me. I may have been in v-ball bliss, but my knees said otherwise...

And then this past Saturday I spent all day at the CC officiating a HS volleyball tourney. It was really good practice for me, since my first match of the season last Thursday was a little tough. I'm definitely rusty on my calls and can't for the life of me follow rotations (it was so much easier as player - I just knew wehre I was supposed to go!), but having a couple other officials there to give me pointers and watch my calls was really helpful. By the end of the day on Saturday (I reffed the championship match, btw) I was all over it! Definitely worked out some of the kinks, and made a nice $150 in the process. :)

OK, so since I started this reffing thing last year, it still amazes me how HARD it is to go from being a player to a ref. I'd imagine it's not too difficult going from player to coach (Elaina is the assistant coach for Whitman, which is totally awesome), but as a ref I have to be completely objective. I can't make faces at a terrible set (although I still do), or whoot and holler at an awesome dig or spike. I can't get pissed at the official for blowing the game, cuz I AM the official!! It's a lot of responsibility to be the deciding factor in a heated match. It's stressful, let me tell you...

Aaaanyway, all this volleyball makes me want to sign up for a doubles tournament or something... although that season is almost over. We'll see if I still want to do it when May rolls around. :)

slr