Some Stuff I Learned Coaching Baseball

This is my second year coaching nine to eleven year olds in the American pastime known as baseball. I learned so much last year. I’m not a rookie any more, but I’m still learning. They seem to be bigger lessons now. Deeper. And they apply to life, not just baseball. It’s weird like that.

These kids, boys and girls alike, are on the field because they want to play, because they’re looking to be a part of team, to have fun, and learn the game. They’re not competing for multimillion dollar contracts. They’re not competing for a first round draft pick. They’re not even competing for a golden glove. They want to hit the ball, run the bases, and perhaps a few of them are looking to get dirty sliding into home. Or second. Or first, even.

Give each of them their chance

Once you take winning and losing off the table, when it’s no longer an option, then the field is wide open. That kid who keeps asking to pitch, but has trouble throwing hard enough to get the ball all the way to the catcher? Give them a chance. At least then they’ll know there are 8 other positions they can try. That kid who has never played baseball before asks repeatedly to be the catcher? Let them armor up and try catching. So what if they make a better goalie than catcher, at least now they know it’s not as easy as it looks. And outfield sucks. The ball is either never hit out there or when it is, you have run to go get it. UGH! Most worstest position, ever!

It’s not always to go your way

Sometimes the umpire does a phenomenal job and sometimes you’re pretty sure Stevie Ray Wonder could have done a better job. Part of our job as coach is teach respect for the other team and for the umpires, so we say nothing. That pitch was at eye level but called a strike? So be it. Just be ready to swing at it next time. You got called out when you were safe? I’m sorry, but we don’t have instant replay. We’ll get ’em next time. This is where we learn “it is what it is”. Arguing is disrespectful. We can’t change the umpires, but we can change our attitude.

It’s not always fair

The kids just want to play ball. So when we showed up to a game with 12 players and the other team had just 6 we didn’t want to cancel. The eighteen kids who showed up would have been disappointed and no one would have gained any experience from that. So we asked if anyone would be willing to play for the other team (they were a team from our town so most of our team knew the other team). Three were willing and that made it nine versus nine. Fair. Then the other team won. With our players! Can you say frustrating? I can. The kids had fun, though. Isn’t that what counts? UGH… I guess so…

Even a rookie can surprise you

Our team this evening was comprised of nine players. Six of them were first year players. Several of them made great plays in the field to get us some outs. They were all swinging the bat to get hits. One nearly hit a homerun (he was tagged out at home). Just because they’re the underdog, just because they’re not expected to perform well, doesn’t mean they’ll live down to that expectation. With just the right piece of advice, or just the right timing, or just the right attitude, they can make the smallest hits into the biggest deals. When given the chance, they can end a losing-by-15 game with laughter.

While the kids are learning about baseball, us coaches are learning about life. Sometimes it’s all home runs. Sometimes it’s nothing but strike outs. Usually, it’s a little of both. We just hope for more home runs and fewer strike outs. We give it our best swing, our best throw, and make the best of it.

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Peace and Chocolate

سلام

I don’t know how up to date on the happenings of Syria you are, but you’re probably as much “in the know” as I am. I know they’re fighting some kind of war and pretty much no one is safe. People have fled the country for their safety in the thousands. Tens of thousands. Millions. In 2016, the U.N. identified 13.5 million Syrians requiring humanitarian assistance. Six million of them are internally displaced and about five million are refugees outside of Syria. In that year 46,700 were admitted to Canada.

This year, one of those families came to our town. They fled to Lebanon seven years ago and lived there until a small group in our town rallied to get them here. The group even fund raised so the family would have enough money to live for a year since the family won’t be allowed any government assistance.

I don’t know about you, but I would have serious trouble if I suddenly found myself in Syria. Not because of the fighting, but because I don’t speak a word of Arabic. Have you seen how Arabic is written? Take a look at those squiggles at the top of this post. Arabic is written from right to left. Books are read front to back. You might as well teach me to flap my arms and fly away.

This family has been very eager to learn. While I would just hide in my house and hope no one noticed me, this family wants to learn. DW has been to their house nearly every day over the last week and a half to talk to them and help them and teach them. I have gone, too, but since I’m still teaching I don’t get to go as often. The boys have joined us. The family has three children, all around our kid’s ages. The great thing about kids playing is they often don’t need words. Play just happens. With the help of DW and a few other significant others, they have come a long way in just 2 weeks. They still have many miles to go, but their determination should see them there. We laugh with them when they tell us we’re teaching them English and they’re teaching us Arabic!

Anyway, a couple years ago a Syrian family moved to a town near us. Turns out the family had a thriving chocolate business in Syria. Or, at least they did until their factory was bombed. They moved here and soon set up a small baby barn to create some chocolate. Peace By Chocolate. Word spread quickly and they were eventually recognized by the Prime Minister. That’s how good their chocolate is. Needless to say, their business is thriving again. Just recently they created a chocolate bar. I know, big deal, right? How many chocolate bars are there in the world already? These chocolate bar wrappers have one word on them. One of those words is the squiggles that are at the top of this post.

Paix. Wantaqo’ti. ਸ਼ਾਂਤੀ سلام

French. Mi’kmaq. Punjabi. Arabic.

Peace. In our area of Canadaland these four languages are prominent and Peace By Chocolate is proving they are here for everyone. If we can all get along here, why can’t it happen all over the world, too?

You can visit them at peacebychocolate.ca. To my knowledge, they ship world wide. It’s worth every bite.

Things I learned After Having Kids

I can only imagine  how much my parents learned about parenthood after I was born. I was colicy. I hated coloring. I painted newspaper to the floor. I joined the wrestling team. While I had a steep learning curve it was mostly because I was the first born. My brother, however, brought whole new challenges to the table. In the beginning, the only electronics we had in the house was an Atari. No tablets. No cell phones. No computers unless you count the Commodor 64. Now we have all that and social media and everyone is “connected” every which to Sunday.

My kids are not me

Oh hell… Who am I kidding. They’re more like me than I care to admit. From “I had it a minute ago, I don’t know where it is now.” To all the broken things. They could tear the hinges off of Hades if only I hadn’t torn them off when I was their age. However, they are more headstrong than I remember myself being. I was a go-with-the-flow kind of kid. These two are not. They know what they want and they are not afraid to ask for it. Or ask Nanny for it. They’re also not afraid to argue their point of view. They haven’t figured out this household isn’t a democracy.

Two kids isn’t easier than one

Silly me. So nieve when I was “young”. One kid was easy. Easy to feed. Easy to entertain. Easy to transport. Easy to put to bed. When we added a second, we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into. When the second was an infant we were so tired to call us zombies would have been a compliment compared to how we felt. Yet no matter how tired we were, we still had our first born to care for. One can stay awake for just so many games of UNO on such little sleep. Now that they’re old, the ideal would be for them to entertain and play with each other. Naturally, we’re not there. Everything is a competition. Everything is a distraction. They live to annoy the shit out of each other. At breakfast time. At suppertime. At bedtime.

The common enemy

It’s us versus them. Having two kids has brought us closer together. “You’re momma told ya not to do that and you went and did it anyway. Don’t come crying to me about it.” It works in reverse, too. Only on rare occassions when we feel the other just needs to take their chill pill will we override the consequences. If they ever realized they could play us against each other, our world would crumble like last Christmas’s gingerbread house.

Not all things are teachable

I’m a teacher. I teach things. All kinds of things. I teach kids to multiply double digits numbers. I teach kids long division. I teach kids to speak with respect to others and to take pride in their work. Do you think I can teach my kids to pick up their toys when they’re done? Do you think I can teach my kids to pee IN the toilet instead of ON it? Do you think I can teach them that life is so much better when they’re playing together rather than fighting together. I just can’t do it.

For the most part, I wasn’t an instigator growing up. My brother was my brother and it usually wasn’t my intent to piss him off. Usually. My two thrive on instigating fights and arguments with each other. Just tonight at bedtime, the youngest was laughing his head off at his brother who was red-in-the-face angry at whatever it was his little brother was doing or saying. We’re not even sure. All we knew was that it was bedtime and they needed to get there before we went batshit crazy like big brother was.

Pride comes in small doses

It could be a random “I love you” or “I like your face” or “thank you for loving me”. It could be an assignment they’re proud of completing in school. It could be at hit they made, a fly ball they caught, a goal they scored. It could be a first word or a first step or reading their first book. Perhaps it was a first solo song or finally getting rid of the training wheels. It could be a new picture for the fridge or special card they made at school.

Wherever it comes from it reaches deep and grabs your heartstrings. When the days end and you feel their little bodies softly slip into slumber, you can’t help but feel the love. They in your loving embrace and you in their warmth and innocence. You kept them alive for yet another day and in that success you can be proud.

You can make me proud by following me on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook…

What I Learned While Coaching Baseball

We played nine games and ended up with a 4-5 record. Almost 500. We didn’t make the playoffs, the end-of-the-year tournament. That was for the top 8 teams. We were 9th. It was a really fun season, though.

Here’s what I know now that I didn’t know then…

Take that chance

Kids want to have fun. Winning is fun. Do you play the kids where they CAN play in order to win or where they WANT to play in order to have the maximum amount of fun? Try to find that middle ground. I think I managed. We had fun. Okay, we didn’t win more than we lost. But this is “just house league” baseball. Everyone plays. No one doesn’t make a team. So let them play. One kid asked to pitch but I didn’t think the kid was capable. I found out later they were more than capable. I didn’t know what that player was really capable of doing because I didn’t take that chance.

Don’t lose your ducks

Get your ducks in a line before they all start telling you where to put them on the field. They all want to pitch and play 1st base. When you have a dozen players you can’t have 6 pitchers and 6 first basemen. Someone has to play the outfield. In house league baseball only one in a thousand hits makes it to the outfield. It’s as boring as watching the outfield grass grow. So get organized before it all falls apart and you’re scrambling not get your ducks in line, but scambling just to find your ducks.

There’s always the next inning

Patience. Baseball is already a game of patience, but if you’re not patient with the kids, you’ve already destroyed the first rule – to have fun. So your team is having an off day at the plate or your pitchers are having an off day on the mound. Off days happen. Mama said there’d be days like this. Take a deep breath, shout a few words of encouragement, and move on to the next inning. Turn your hat around, kick some dust, do the hokey pokey. That’s what it’s all about.

One inning at a time

Sometimes things work out – you tie the game at a crucial point. Sometimes they don’t – you give up the winning run in the last inning. Sometimes there will be surprises (when the new kid hits a double). But no matter what, you gotta roll with it. Take the ups, the downs, the four run innings. In the game of baseball, as in the game of life, there will be good times, rough times, and times that take you completely by surprise. Enjoy every minute of it. Except the bad times. You can laugh at those later. You just have to take it one inning at a time.

Make it happen

You have more power, strength, and lucky than you think. You can make a strike out feel like a home run because at least the kid was swinging and not running from the ball. Or you can make a single feel like slap in the face because an experienced player swung at a wild pitch. You can make a team work together. Or you can let them fight over positions. You can make an out seem like a miracle. But you will never make outfield the place everyone wants to play. With a little ingenuity and the right words you can make anything happen. Make someone’s day or ruin it. Make your own day and not let anyone ruin it.

Go Ask Your Father: Fat Lips, Vision, AEDs, and Undertows

Happy Thursday night or whatever time of the week it happens to be for you when you’re reading this. I’m settling in getting ready for yet another snow storm. School was cancelled Monday because of snow. It was cancelled Wednesday because of ice. It’s likely the kids will be home to drive me nuts again tomorrow because of more snow and ice. I’m putting them work if they’re home tomorrow!

Why do we get fat lips?

You can tell a lot about a person by looking at their lips. You can tell if they’re wearing lipstick, for instance. You tell how big their labial tubercle (that bump in the middle of the upper lip) is. And women, did you know the bigger your labial tubercle the easier it is for you to achieve orgasm? You can also tell if they’ve been in a fight. When the soft tissue of the lips is damaged it becomes inflamed and swollen. This creates what we all know as a fat lip. Bet you never look at lips the same way again.

Beside getting a taste of a knuckle sandwich, fat lips can also be caused by dehydration, an allergic reaction, from a food allergy, or sunburn.

How do eye glasses work?

DW and I are nearsighted (myopia). She wears her glasses all the time. I have a tendency to lose mine. One pair is at the bottom of a river. Being farsighted simply means that our eyes do not have adequate focusing power. In other words, the focus point falls behind the retina instead of on it. Farsightedness (hyperopia) is exactly opposite – it forms a focus point in front of the retina. So eye glasses and contact lenses redirect the light so that it focuses the image on your retina so you see a clear picture.

The top image shows how light focuses on the retina.

What’s an AED?

While ice skating yesterday, Bang noticed an odd looking box attached the wall outside of the ice rink. Naturally curious he wanted to know what it was. It was an AED or Automated External Defibrillator. Automated because all a user needs to do is follow audio commands connect adhesive electrodes to the patient and from there the computer takes over to check for a pulse and heart rhythm. It will only deliver a shock if it detects a heart that is in ventricular fibrillation (Vfib), when the heart beats with rapid, erratic electrical impulses. This causes pumping chambers in your heart (the ventricles) to quiver uselessly, instead of pumping blood. The shock momentarily stuns the heart and gives it the chance to resume beating effectively. Essentially, it turns it off and turns it back on it again to restart it.

What’s an undertow?

Not to be confused with rip currents, an undertow occurs in all bodies of water where waves crash on shore. It’s strongest in surf zones where the waves are larger. After the wave rolls onto shore gravity pulls back toward the ocean and the water rushes back out collecting in the next wave. This outward rush of water and the inward rush of a wave creates an undertow. They are only dangerous to those who can’t stand against the backwash (outward rush of water) like children as the undertow only goes out to next incoming wave.

 

Go Ask Your Father: Zamboni, Santa, Grammar, and Electric Blankets

I suppose everyone is feeling sluggish coming out of their turkey comas. Here in Canada we don’t get the day off for American Thanksgiving. Since we were all in school and Crash had a choir concert after school we didn’t even get the chance to call my family to tell everyone Happy Thanksgiving. I tried to thank them and tell them I miss them in yesterday’s post. We will be celebrating American Thanksgiving tomorrow with a 20 pound turkey and our Canadian family. In the meantime, I will be fielding the endless questions being fired at me like a gangster’s Tommy Gun.

How does a Zamboni work?

The boys have been ice skating about twice a week for the past couple weeks. They are loving to learn. It’s great exercise too. They’re soaked in sweat after our hour on the ice. Crash doesn’t crash as often and Bang is starting to skate without his skate trainer. After the hour of public skate is over, we get off the ice to make room for the boys’ favorite machine. An ice resurfacer, like those made by Zamboni, have several functions. It washes the ice, shaves the ice and leaves behind a layer of fresh ice. A blade shaves off a thin layer of ice while a horizontal and vertical screw (an auger) moves the shaved ice to the snow tank (that’s the big box on the front). Water is fed onto the ice rink to wash it. A squeegee collects the dirty water and it’s vacuumed, filtered and returned to the water tank. Finally, clean water is delivered to the ice and spread evenly with a “towel”. The clean water freezes on the rink surface leaving a clean, smooth surface for the skaters.

What does Santa bring if you cry for no reason? 

This is a question that arises every year. Last year when I told Bang that he brings coal, he thought that was simply fantastic. He wanted coal! So I added in that he also bring blueberries. He hates blueberries. This did the trick. He understood that if you were bad and cried for no reason Santa would come and bring you something you didn’t want. Or he would bring you nothing. Since the floodgates were opened turning the gears of thought, more questions followed suit.

“What if someone throws a snowball at you and you cry?”
Depends on if they threw to be mean to start a snowball fight because snowball fights are fun.

“What if you whine for no reason?”
Then you get blueberries.

“Will he still come if you cry when you get hurt?”
Yep. He will still come if you cry because you are hurt.

“Will he come if I say frickin’?”
Only if you say it at home. He won’t come if you say it anywhere else.

I’ll answer the other questions about what do with the coal and sticks you get when you are bad next week.
Why is “them” and not “it”?

Ah… A grammar question. Love it!
Ah… Grammar questions. Love them!

Spot the difference? Bang noticed this difference in a book he was reading. (Did I mention before that he’s reading now? In case I didn’t see here or here or here). One sentence read “Dad gave the cheese to Kate and she put it in the cart.” The next sentence was “Dad gave the apples to Kate and she put them in the cart.” So I pointed out the difference by asking him how many cheeses there were (he answered 1) and how many apples (he answered 3 after looking at the picture). When there is just 1 thing we use “it”. When there is more than one thing, we use “them”. I didn’t get into the “thing” being the subject of the sentence. It’ll get tricky later when there is 1 group.

Is it “I told the group of people it needed to be quiet.”
Or is it “I told the group of people, they needed to be quiet.”
It’s one group so it should be it. It’s many people so it should be they.
How do electric blankets work?

Living in Canada they’re almost a necessity. Unless you like climbing into bed that could be happily occupied by penguins. Not the Pittsburgh kind, either. We use it to toast the sheets. We turn it on, then do our bedtime routine – put on pyjamas, brush and floss our teeth, and go pee. When we slide between the sheets they’re roasty toasty and we flick the blanket off. A preheated bed is heavenly!

This is simple science. An insulated wire is placed in a fabric designed to be heated. The wire has a bit of resistance to an electrical current. This resistance causes it to heat up, much like the burners on your stove top. Thanks to Captain Obvious we know the wires in a blanket don’t get as hot as the burners on your stove top. The electric blanket has a control so you can decide how warm you want the blanket to get. This control often has an auto-shutoff and a device to prevent it from overheating.

On cold, weekend mornings, it’s not uncommon to find the four of us snuggled in Mom and Dad’s bed under the electric blanket watching Disney Jr.

Wed Nes Day

There’s a picture of it on the internet therefore I am not the only who does this. I spell it like it sounds. That’s fonetix for you.

Exept fonetiks dusnt werk all the tim

If you can read that, you must be a teacher.

Have you ever watched a blooming reader? I’ve seen it many many times now. Never did it make such an impact on me as watching my own two boys learn that letters have certain sounds associated with them. Put the right letters together and you can make a word. Put the right words together and you can make a sentence. Put the right sentences together an you can make a paragraph. Put the right paragraphs together and you can make book.

Crash has now written 4 or 5 books. Mind you, they are entry level readers he wrote for his 5 year old brother, but still. He wrote books. He, himself, is reading slightly above grade level. His brother is following suit.

But the English language is anything but easy. Bang catches on really quick to word families. He sounds them out one letter at a time to discover the word. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t.

Look and Loot do not sound alike.
Hair and care do sound alike.

Then there’s enough, though, plough, and cough.

WTH?

Ignoring the exceptions, of which there are many, he sounds out new words perfectly. After reading them a few times they become locked away in the sight word vault. I wish I could memorize things as easily.

Alas, I have a photographic memory. I just don’t have an SD card. I have memory like a sieve. It’s on par with that of a goldfish…

I had it a minute ago, I don’t know where it is now.

Anyway, what was I talking about?

Oh yeah. Reading…

Bang comes home with a new book to read from school every day. He’s already progressed three levels since September. Crash reads every night as well. He’ll either read to himself or to his mom or I. Then we’ll ask him about what he read. Lately, he’s into books that take place within the world of Minecraft. But isn’t that the beauty of books? There’s something out there for all of us.

Watching an emerging reader is much like watching butterfly emerge from its chrysalis. That it takes years instead of minutes makes it that much more exciting.

I wonder what kinds of chapter books he’ll like to read?

What kinds of books do your kids enjoy reading?

To Crochet or Not to Crochet…

To crochet indeed.

Boy, I’ve got a yarn for you!

Have you ever been married to someone for 10+ years and you know them so well that you can make their coffee exactly the way they like it? You finish each others sandwiches sentences. You know their hopes and dreams and they’ve become your hopes and dreams. You know their worries and stresses and how to conquer them.

Then one day they return from running errands with a few balls of yarn, a book and some crocheting hooks. Or are they needles like in knitting? You’re left wondering, huh? Or WTH? Since when did you want to learn to crochet? Where did this come from?

I looked up the difference between knitting and crocheting. I still don’t know other than knitting uses two pointy sticks and crocheting uses just one not so pointy hook. My mom is knitter my DW is a crocheter.

Turns out it’s a better hobby than those adult coloring books. Yes, we have a few of those, too. Unlike a coloring book, after a crochet project is finished there is a usable item. Be it a coaster, a wash cloth, a dishcloth or a hat. However, like coloring, it can be a stress reliever. It becomes a project that diverts attention away from the frustrations we encounter in every day life. Bonus? It can be done while you watch Gold Rush (or any show/movie of your choosing).

So DW came home with some yarn and a book on how to crochet. Like trying to learn guitar by reading about it, it wasn’t easy. Actually, it was closer to impossible. Like hearing the guitar note in the book. But she didn’t give up and toss the hooks in the trash. Instead, she took to YouTube. What can’t you learn on YouTube? It was like a personal trainer. She had someone explaining how to get started, how read the pattern, and how to finish it.

Her first attempt wasn’t perfect. A crooked dishcloth. We kept it. It was her first and it still cleans the dishes. Her second attempt was a double crochet dishcloth. It came out wrong. Did she quit? Nope. She ripped it all apart and started over. The second time was the charm. Boom, we’ve got two dishcloths now.

Then she upped the ante. Her third project? A hat. Crash asked to have the first one. So DW got a measurement and set to work. She wasn’t exactly using “boyish” colors but that didn’t phase Crash any. He just wanted hat made by mom. She worked on that thing non-stop. She was as excited about it coming along as Crash was to see it coming along. She wanted to do a little something extra to it so it wouldn’t be just a plain old hat. So I suggested putting a mohawk on it. I marked on the calendar the good idea I had. They don’t come often, you know!

Lesson: if you want to learn something new the only thing stopping you is yourself.

The hat is finished and they’re both proud as punch about it. It was nice to see her embark upon a new project that she was excited to learn. Even if I had no idea she was interested in learning. Now, if I could just learn guitar as fast as she learned to crochet.

On another note, Crash has been asking to start a YouTube channel. Guess what I did this evening? Started his Youtube channel. He wants to make videos on how build various Lego creations he has constructed. Today’s video is just over a minute long. He started with an extremely easy build. A Minecraft grass block. Have a look here. I think we’ll aim to post a new video weekly, for now. Or whenever we get around to it. Feel to subscribe!

 

Teacher’s Kids

What’s it like having two teachers as parents? Kelly over at Bustle knows pretty well it’s like.

Crash and Bang have the advantage (curse?) of having not one teacher parent, but two.  It has its advantages – access to parts of the school other kids don’t get to see, get to be in school when there is no one else there, get to have mom or dad as a teacher (this is both a pro and a con). On the other hand, it also has some disadvantages – you get mom or dad as your teacher, every teacher in the school knows who you are, you have to stay after school when you’d rather go home, and expectations are set a bit higher.

So far Crash is still pretty excited to see me in school. Even as his substitute teacher. I’m hoping it stays this way, but I’m certainly not expecting it to.

Right now I’m only substituting. However, this still gives me access to the school as if I were a full time teacher. I use the teacher’s lounge. I can enter and exit through the staff doors. I am the first one in and last one out of the classroom. This means that Crash can do these things, too. Though, I keep him out of the staff room if there are other teachers in there. It’s not a place for sensitive ears. If I’m subbing for the gym teacher he gets to use the whole gym. To himself. Show me a kid who doesn’t want full run of a gymnasium and I’ll show you a kid who probably doesn’t like gym! This is true of the classroom, too. It’s something different for a kid to be in their teacher’s classroom all by themselves.  The quiet. The empty desks. The cleanliness.

Then there’s being your kid’s teacher. I’m not sure exactly how he feels when hears his classmates tell him “Your dad is our teacher!” He knew this before he even got to school. Now he has to hear it over and over as each classmate realizes this. Over and over. And Over.

Then there are the expectations. Stereotypical teacher’s kids are held to slightly higher standards than the general population of the school. Being teachers, we know how students should behave in school and we therefore start teaching this to our own kids at birth. Also, as teachers who love to teach, we begin teaching our own kids while still in the womb. I know I was reading to DW’s baby belly for both of our sons. So teacher’s kids are not only expected to behave, but also be smart.

Every teacher in the school knows who Crash is. Or at least every teacher who knows me and DW (also a teacher). Therefore, there are eyes on him at all times. I know about things he’s done before he knows I know about them. One day he’ll tell me I was always spying on it. S’okay, though, it’s for his own good. And I do spy, by the way. If I’m subbing at his school I will, at least once, peek through his classroom door at him to see what he’s up to.

It’s not so bad being a teacher’s kid. Except, this evening, Crash was complaining about having to practice math. “I have to do math for like two hours in school. Then, I come home and have to do it for 15 more!” Sorry kiddo. Not everyone gets to have a teacher mom and dad. But you do. So lets get ‘er done and make ya fast at addition and subtraction so we can do some multiplication! HA!