When did I turn into Ward Cleaver?

Today I took off a little early from work to take my son to his Little League game. As someone who played soccer in high school as an act of defiance against football-addled Southern culture, I find my children's participation in organized sports slightly mystifying. It's not particularly mysterious, though: it's completely my wife's fault, as she's the big baseball fan in the family.

The local league is a typical Silicon Valley reinvention of an American institution. Almost all the teams are sponsored by dot-coms, financial services companies, or French restaurants. A couple weeks ago, my son's team, the Astros (sponsored by visual search engine SearchMe.com) played against the Yankees (eHealth.com); last week, they went up against the As (sponsored by Interwoven).

Today, they played the Orioles (sponsored by Left Bank).

After the game, we went back to Peninsula, to the annual student rock concert. The concert is a fun time, as much (or maybe just a tiny bit more) for the atmosphere as for the music. And as one of my fellow parents put it, it's nice for the kids to spend time on campus without all the high-pressure academic stress weighing them down....

Though it can be entertaining to hear the kids.

My daughter is already talking about what songs she wants to sing when she's old enough to perform next year.

So my afternoon and evening were taken up with Little League and a student concert. I truly have been domesticated....

[To the tune of Lucrezio de Seta & His Scurvy Brothers, "Century's End," from the album "The Nightfly Live Show".]

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