Batter Up!

As part of my state primary school curriculum, it was compulsory for us tykes to compete in Summer and Winter sports against other local schools. I was far from an asset to the team and our school was generally quite shit at sport so I didn't feel too bad as we probably lost more games than won. Whilst the opposing school usually were meticulous in their matching uniforms, we were the side full of misfits with a half-baked semblance of a team. I recall my best friend at the time being jibed by the other team for wearing a Kylie Minogue t-shirt. This of course when Kylie sported a daggy, fluffy perm and before her rebirth as the Princess of Pop.

Netball was my Winter sport. The other options were AFL or Soccer and as if I was going to play either of those. In Summer, I had the choice of Cricket (ppfffffftttt), Rounders or Softball.

I don't know how I ended up in the Softball team but I think it was partly because the Rounders team actually had a bit of talent and it was popular with other female students. All the boys wanted to play Cricket of course. So where do the all the kids who are don't like/aren't good at sport go? They were sometimes the socially awkward ones too. They go to the Softball team!

That's not to say I wasn't actually good at Softball. I wasn't great but I could hit the ball and make it to the first base sometimes. Every now and then I would make it all the way back to the home plate. Yay! Still, I wasn't about to win MVP or anything like that.

So, when Smee suggested going to the only baseball batting cage in London I got really excited :D Was I really any good at softball? Or was it all in my head? There was only one way to find out.

Smee in his gear.... or doing his best Marvin the Martian impersonation.

Me gearing up for my turn *stupid grin*

I made contact with the ball!!! Nothing but bat.... ooooh yeah...

... and off the ball goes into the net.... ooooh yeah...

Smee and his swing.

I initially was using a baseball bat and it was surprisingly heavy and hurt my wrist each time I made a swing. I didn't realise it was a baseball bat until the cages' maintenance guy handed us a softball bat after seeing me in the softball cage. Oh, that was much better, much lighter.

I only batted in the softball (not baseball) cages and only in the slow - medium cage. Strike rate was about 75% - yay! Smee starting getting a bit scared cos I was whacking the ball with extreme enthusiasm.

After a while my forearms really started to hurt but I was addicted and kept wanting to bat more and more! I could have happily continued but it started getting darker and forearms were hurting too much. In fact as I type this, they're quite sore and I had difficulty unbuttoning my jeans. You don't realise how often you use your forearms until they are suffering from muscular pain!

Anyway if it weren't for the park being so far, I would go to the cages regularly. So so fun!