As the softball team prepared to spend Spring Break playing tournaments in Florida, Sun columnist Per Ostman shagged flies with senior Of Kate Varde.
1. You’re on pace to shatter the Cornell career HR record; you’re the owner of both the women’s clean record and the 40-yd dash record. Should we be checking you for steroids?
Ha. You don’t need to. I set the clean record as a sophomore, and I really haven’t cleaned since. I lost a lot of weight, which is good because I was starting to look like a guy. You know, with the whole neck thing and all that.
So, you’re off the ‘roids now?
Yeah, I’ve lost all the facial hair.
2. Collegiate softball uses bright yellow balls for some reason. Do you prefer white balls or neon balls?
I really don’t have any preference. Balls are balls. I do like to sleep with my balls, though.
3. It’s an understatement to say that you’re a good hitter. Could you get a hit off Jennie Finch?
No. Definitely not. We played LSU my freshman year, and I struck out three times. I don’t think I even touched the ball; no foul tips, nothing. It was just whiff, after whiff, after whiff. There’s no way I could touch her.
4. Jennie Finch won a College Softball World Series with Arizona, she’s on the national team, and she’s headed to Athens this fall. Her fiance` is a farmhand for the Anaheim Angles. If you’re the better athlete in the relationship, does that cause tension?
I don’t know where to go with this. Being a major league baseball player is a big accomplishment, even if you suck. I’d be happy dating a major leaguer.
Even if you could snap your boyfriend over your knee like kindling?
I’d never date a guy who I could break in half. You need something to hang on to, you know?
Yes, I do.
5. What’s the hottest men’s team at Cornell?
That’s difficult, because there aren’t many. Baseball’s close, because they got those freshmen … let me ask my roommates
I’m interviewing you, you know.
Hold on … Ok, we’re going to go with baseball.
Are any of you guys dating any baseball players?
No, some of my roommates did, but not anymore.
Wow, I think that’s the first non-biased answer to this question that anyone has given me.
Wait, you’re on the crew team, right?
Yes.
Ok. Crew is by far the hottest team. Hot bodies, hot muscles…
Flattery will get you everywhere. We run around in spandex all the time. We’re like wrestlers without the cauliflower ear and ringworm.
You guys are taller though, so that’s good.
6. What is your favorite major league baseball team?
I always root for the Cubs. I’m from Chicago.
Have you ever been to Wrigley?
I try to go at least once a summer. My friend’s parents have these great seats in seventh row up on the third baseline.
You don’t sit in the bleachers like a red-blooded god-fearing Cubs fan?
Well, if you walk up on the day of the game, they sell “standing room only” tickets for like ten dollars. But we don’t stand, we sit wherever we can.
Aren’t the ushers at Wrigley seat-facists like they are everywhere else?
You’ve got to know what you can get away with. If you get caught, you can always just smile and they’ll probably let you go.
See, I’m male. If I did that, it wouldn’t have the same effect.
I guess not.
7. Would you rather have the strength of 100 men, the power of invisibility, or the ability to fly?
Definitely not the strength of 100 men.
Why?
Because I’m a woman! I don’t need that strength!
Yikes.
This is a tough one. Can I have a moment?
Sure. Who are you talking to?
It’s my imaginary friend.
Does he have a name? Can you put him on the phone?
Call him Charlie. He doesn’t want to talk to you.
Oh.
Being invisible is really sketchy because you could sneak in and watch people do stuff.
You’re not very voyeuristic, are you?
I think flying would be cool. You could travel the world and see cool places. Oh! And you could get everywhere really fast, so I could fly home and see my friends or something whenever I wanted.
8. What’s so “soft” about softball?
Oh god, there are these cheesy shirts that old ladies wear at games. They say, “There’s Nothing Soft About It!” It’s terrible.
But correct, eh?
Yeah, there’s nothing soft at all.
I can tell — the sports department’s stock photo of you shows you batting with a bruise the size of a cantelope on your thigh.
The worst part about it was that the pitcher hit me on a 3-0 count. Why couldn’t she just walk me?
Bob Gibson used to do that.
It stayed there for six months!
9. If you could eat dinner with any three people in history, living or dead, who would they be?
I don’t know, this is a thinker question. Can I email you back or something?
This is going in tomorrow’s paper. Ask Charlie.
You’re not really putting that in, are you? That was a joke.
Oh. Well, think of something. How about, “my mom, my dad, and Jesus.”
Definitely not Jesus.
Are you Jewish?
No, I just wouldn’t want to eat dinner with him.
Yeah, I guess I can see that. He’d be turning all the water to wine and trying to serve everyone with the same freaking loaf of bread, trying to pin betrayal on you.
10. Will you be able to make it to and Spring Training games while you’re down in Florida?
We don’t really have that much time. We play doubleheaders almost every day. We get one day off and we usually go to either Medieval Times or the Island of Adventure.
You’d rather go to Medieval Times than a baseball game???
No, I’d go to the Island of Adventure. It’s like Six Flags. You can go to a baseball game anytime, but you can’t always go to an amusement park.
So, I guess I can’t get you to slash A-Rod’s achilles tendons for me, huh?
Maybe if I have the opportunity. He’s a jerk. I’ll get Charlie to do it.
Excellent.
Archived article by Per Ostman