Don't Know Why I Do It

I sometimes find myself wondering why I haven't had the time to finish reading that book that I've been reading for the past three months, it seems. Seems like I used to be reading a new book every other day, and in fact when I was in grad school that was often the case. But that was a while back, in fact, way back. Well, what I've been doing today might explain why I'm not getting those books read as fast anymore.

I spent well over an hour with a guy who is also a manager in what's called The Great American Fantasy League (GAFL). It's a bunch of 30 baseball crazed guys who each manage a team of all-time greats from each of the 30 major league teams. It's a variation of the Statis-Pro baseball game. We play a regular 162-game schedule one game per week. A season takes about four years to complete. Well over an hour learning how to do something I'm going to tell you about

The guy who is the "commissioner" for this league has been the self-appointed one responsible for all the record keeping and creation of all the player cards necessary for the game, which number in the thousands. And get this, he's been doing these by hand. For years. And he's been keeping all the league records also by hand. Amazing!!

So I and several other people have been urging the league leadership (this guy) to get in the 21st century. We are finally succeeding because a computer wizard named Paul has taken over management of the Arizona Diamondbacks. Paul has succeeded in getting the commissioner to agree to computerized player cards that will incorporate splits for batters, i.e., they will hit differently against right-handed pitchers than they do against left-handed pitchers, and the same will be true of pitchers. They will fare better against guys who bat the same way they throw. Just like real baseball, and it will add a huge dimension of realism to our game that's not there now.

To get to the point of this . . . these new cards for the hitters with this information have to be computer-generated, which involves a process for each hitter. Cannot believe I have volunteered to help do this. Right now I'm working through a team . . . and I'm gaining on it, that is, doing the work without making mistakes . . . it's all done on Excel spreadsheet, and there are several ways to err.

So that's the meaning of the title: Don't Know Why I Do It . . . take on these voluntary tasks when I could be doing something else better for sure.