NGSL Pays Etsy Witch to Stop Rain; Hurricane Ensues
Editors’ Actually Sincere Note: We could not be more proud and excited to congratulate UVA for sweeping the 43rd Annual Softball Invitational, winning the Co-Rec Championship and Open Championship titles, as well as Colleen Sullivan ’27 for winning the Non-Male Home Run Derby. We look forward to running our recap of their impressive feats and their successful tournament in next week’s issue.
Last weekend, the Law School hosted the forty-third UVA Law Softball Invitational. Nine days prior to the event, the North Grounds Softball League (NGSL) tournament directors consulted their iPhone weather apps, which provided that the chance of rain during the tournament was a manageable 65 percent. Reclining in their Lay-Z-Boys, beers koozied in their palms, they feared not. “We are at UVA Law,” they thought. “Moreover, we are NGSL. This is our event; it will go off without a hitch.” The Law School was still nine days out from the event. Given the Charlottesville weather this month (contrast March 12’s eighty-six degrees with March 13’s snowfall in Spies Garden), it was simply too soon to worry.
Five days before the tournament, the chance of precipitation rose to 85 percent. Two days before the tournament, 93 percent. NGSL held an emergency meeting to discuss, in earnest, how they could control the weather. First, they called the United States National Weather Service. When God answered, they said, “Whoa, God, you work for the NWS?” He said, “Yes. Hey, sorry, I can’t really help with this. I’m still tied up trying to get people to stop saying I am a woman. Not that there is anything wrong with it if I were. I just—I’m not. Don’t print this. Ok bye.” Undeterred, on the eve of the event, NGSL logged on to the craft and services exchange platform Etsy to resort to the use of the dark arts. (NGSL wishes to emphasize that this was the first time they appropriated school funds for this purpose.) They hired an Etsy Witch to cast a Good Weather Spell for $28.23. Their fears placated, they went to sleep on Thursday night peacefully.
On Friday morning, law students awoke early to rays of sunshine. They filed to class under sunny skies, brimming with excitement and eagerly searching for “where they could find those green wristbands that tell people I’m single.” Around 11 a.m., the sound of thunder cracked so loudly that everyone in Walter Brown rushed toward the windows. The sun over Spies was suddenly swallowed up by gloomy, gray clouds. A National Weather Service alert message pinged in unison through the crowds of students, reading “Beware: 200 percent chance of precipitation. I am a man.”
Sheets of rain fell from the sky angrily. NGSL concluded that since these games are sponsored events, and they had already spent all of the money, the tournament must go on. In a last-minute schedule revision, NGSL decided to bump up the Alumni match between UVA Law and Harvard Law School.
Shaking in their cleats, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Dean Leslie Kendrick took the field first for UVA, as pitcher and catcher, respectively. For Harvard, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was up to bat first. She swung at RFK’s first pitch, and the bat flew right out of her hands and into left field, where it struck her base coach, Mitt Romney. He fell to the ground and lay there unconscious. Justice Jackson did, however, make it to first base. RFK yelled something about vaccines to Dean Kendrick that she couldn’t hear, to which she nodded so he would stop talking.
At the top of the third inning, the biting wind picked up. The few student spectators who were sitting on the metal bleachers watched the tree branches sway so wildly that they knew something must be very wrong. At that moment, another alert was drafted: “SEVERE WEATHER STORM: Category Five Hurricane to Strike Charlottesville. EVACUATE NOW. Also, I support women and gays, I’m just saying that I am not either of those things.” Unfortunately, regretting His tone and word choice, God unsent the message.
At the bottom of the sixth inning, with UVA Law up twelve to ten, Hurricane Res Ipsa roared onto Park Five. John Jeffries benefited from the wind carrying the softball he hit all the way to Waynesboro, giving him a grand slam. The cheering student spectators all stood on the top row of the bleachers to stay above the rapidly rising water levels, to no avail. The power of Res Ipsa uprooted the bleachers and carried the students downstream. Bats and softballs began flying through the sky. Mitt Romney’s still unconscious body floated through the streets all the way to Crozet, where he regained consciousness only to find that the bar would not honor the drink promotions. Dean Kendrick, furious that Harvard was running for shelter, threw down her glove in despair, demanding that UVA be credited with the win.
An hour after the field had been washed away, Stephen Parr sent an email saying that the rest of the games would move online.
By Saturday, the streets and fields were miraculously cleared. After two more days of impressive competition, UVA swept the competition. UVA Gold and UVA Iron took home the Co-Rec League and Open League championship titles in the forty-third Softball Invitational.
Author: Alexis Pudvan ’28 nrt9un@virginia.edu