[aceholleran]

Game is a rout. As losers take last licks, R1, running unwisely, interferes with F3, who is attempting to field a pop-up. It's a 100 percenter; couldn't NOT call it. It's the penultimate out in the game.

Losing skip has a cow and lets loose with a volley of invective right in my puss, forcing me to run him. Again, couldn't NOT do it.

I head up to press box/changing room after game. It's on a second level, with an outside staircase. I can hear parents grumbling outside, so I hang inside for a while, trying to use discretion, which I admit is a dictum I do not always follow.

Finally, I hear one woman's frantic voice, screaming, "I want to see that umpire!" Too juicy for me, so I take the bait. I stand on the second floor landing, in mufti.

"Are you the umpire who called my Jason out?" she keens.

It didn't take Conan Doyle acumen to figure who "her Jason" might have been. I smiled as hugely as I could. "That would be me," I say sweetly.

She lets loose with a few blasts concerning my eyesight, ethics, parentage and other obvious flaws in my worldview. My smile never wanes. She then rummages in her copious, TrashMart purse for a pen and paper. "I want your name, so I can report you to the league."

"No problem, " I say. "Palermo. Steve Palermo. P-A-L-E-R-M-O." Which she scribbles down.

Couldn't NOT do it.

Ace