Before the first pitch of the EWBL playoffs, Chris spent an entire day preparing our backyard for what he apparently believes is the World Series. There were "decorations" to hang and several hours devoted to cutting letters out of cardboard so he could spray-paint enormous words onto the grass. I watched this man painstakingly measure, cut, position, and paint each letter with a level of patience and attention to detail I have never personally experienced in our marriage. For our anniversary, I got a card from Shopper Drug Mart. For a wiffle ball game played by middle-aged men, he apparently has the time and energy to turn the property into Wrigley Field. I'm not saying he loves wiffle ball more than his family, but I've never seen him spend six hours making sure our sons birthday decorations were perfectly centred.

The Donkeys beat the Turkeys 2-1. Three runs. Four innings. Twelve total hits between two teams. I was told beforehand this would be "a war," and I assumed that meant something would happen. Instead I watched what the gentlemen present kept calling an incredible defensive battle, which from a lawn chair looks identical to nobody hitting the ball anywhere.

Austin ended it in the bottom of the fourth with a home run, his second of the night which means that for one game a man in jogging pants hit more homers than the rest of the players combined. He rounded the bases at a jog so slow that two children lost interest and went inside to play minecraft. The celebration involved a cooler being overturned, and later righted, and later apologized for.

"We executed our game plan to perfection," said Chris, whose game plan, as described to me earlier that week, was "Put up a ton of runs."

The Turkeys got their lone run in the second. Dean had two hits in six trips, Bergman two in five, and Kevin squeezed an infield hit out, and nobody on either team struck out all night, which the men took as proof of elite contact hitting rather than evidence that the pitching is thrown slow by a fancy blue machine.

"Tough one to swallow, but I'm proud of the effort we gave out there," said Kevin, who wouldn't shut up about the hit he legged out to first.

Some context for the Turkeys, who arrived at 2-6: the Donkeys beat them 14-1 on September 23 and 6-0 on September 30. Losing by one is, apparently, enormous progress. I was informed of this three times by Dean.

The Donkeys are off to the finals, which my husband seems more excited about than when we had our first child.