Thursday, April 26, 2007

The Sports Post

I think I probably do one of these about once per month, right? Let's hit the circuit.

The Tigers are starting to look like they'll win 95 games again. The offense was cooking last night. Durbin had a 3-spot when he took the mound; that had to feel good for a guy whose ERA was also the amount of his lunch check yesterday. Sheffield and Ordonez just need to be average. Nothing more. Granderson is rockin,' Guillen is doing fine, Inge needs to step it up, and so does Monroe. Just hit, guys! The weather can't be an excuse forever.

Last comment on last night's Tigers game: Zumaya didn't get any calls. Yeah, he was rattled, but he got about 5 bad calls. That was not cool.

Red Wings and Sharks starts tonight. I'm nervous. I think most Wings' fans most vivid memory of the Sharks is April 1994, Game 7, 1st round (or Western Conference Quarterfinals for those who prefer the official NHL lexicon). Osgood tries to clear the puck around the right side boards, Jamie Baker pinches it, keeps it in the zone, and fires it past Osgood to clinch the series for San Jose. A 1-8 upset. It was awful. At that moment, I thought that team would NEVER win a Cup. So 13 years later, the Sharks still make me nervous. I worry that they're a similar team to the Wings with a Shanahan-style scorer in Jonathan Cheechoo. I think this game, and series, will be won in the Wings own end. The Wings need to hold SJ to less than 25 shots every night. Any more than that and they lose.

The real reason for the fear of play in their own zone is what we saw in the Calgary series. In Game 3 especially, good forechecking by the Flames and sloppy passing by the Wings saw a lot of quality scoring chances for Calgary. It doesn't matter how good you are, most goalies are not going to do particularly well against point blank shots from guys like Phaneuf and Iginla. Same goes for Thornton and Cheechoo. PROTECT THE PUCK. Hopefully Zetterberg is back for Game 2 (flu tonight), or things could get tricky. I still take the Wings in 6.

EEEEWWWW. This just in: Zetterberg will play tonight, Holmstrom will miss Games 1-3. Not good.

All of this renders the Pistons game almost unnecessary to watch. "Oh, but Games 1 and 2 were close!" you say. No. No they weren't. Orlando had no chance to win either game. I love Jameer Nelson. He's a very good player. We went to the same university. He was largely responsible for one of the best seasons in St Joe's history. But he turns the ball over too much for Orlando to have a shot at winning even one game against the Pistons. If it's a fast-paced game tonight, it will not even be close. Pistons win by 12.

And a pox upon your house if you're planning to watch the NFL draft. Don't succumb to the stupidity. Kornheiser is basically saying that he'll be there because he gets a check for being there.

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Boris, Must Get Moose and Squirrel!

The coverage of and reaction to Boris Yeltsin's death has been bizarre, in my opinion. The Drudge Report, which I see as a perfect media mirror to the American public's news interests, never even made it the top headline. Instead, a story about that wacky liberal Sheryl Crow saying we should only use one square of toilet paper per "visit" was the top story. All day. it was a biggie on Fox News too. But not anywhere else. What a shock. And now apparently it was a joke?

Onto Mr Yeltsin. For a country that feared the Soviet Union so much, I was surprised that this wasn't a bigger deal here. I was under the impression (rightfully so, I think, because a lot of media outlets described him this way) that Americans thought Yeltsin had a lot to do with the ending of Communism. One headline said he defended democracy from the top of a tank. Well, kind of. The attempted coup at the White House in August 1991 went a lot deeper than this, but not to most of the world, apparently.

Yeltsin was as corrupt and power-hungry as those who came before him. He had a 5% approval rating 3 months before the 1996 presidential elections and managed to win. He went to a runoff - but in the end, he won. There were all kinds of questions about his daughter Tatiana and her relationships with Russian oligarchs (business/media "tycoons") - but Boris won. He nearly died in office, depending on who you talk to - but in 1996, he won.

President Bush is not attending any of the functions surrounding Yeltsin's death. I think this is odd, and raises the question "Where is the line?" Is Bush simply not attending because he never worked with Yeltsin as his father and Bill Clinton did? Does he feel that his friendship/working relationship with Putin would be changed if he attended? What's the state of his relationship with Putin?

I guess this is what dorky kids do, but in high school (OK, freshman year of college too) we would yell out the name of a foreign leader every time we got a rebound. Much better than Joakim Noah's screams/grunts/bellows. This actually promoted knowledge of world affairs. I mean, wouldn't you go back to your dorm and Google (wait, not back then. We used the finest Internet search engine available, the great Excite.) Mahathir Mohamed? Boris Yeltsin had a permanent place as one of the first three rebounds of the game. He was that well known.

The Russian people are very divided on whether Russia improved during Yeltsin's tenure. Religion made a return, as evidenced by the nature and location of his funeral. Bootleg DVDs and CDs showed up too. Well, in greater quantities anyway. But inflation was rampant, life expectancy decreased, drug and alcohol abuse increased, and so on. The Russian space program now launches from Kazakhstan, which is sort of a bone of contention. Imagine if NASA facilities had been located in Cuba before 1957 and we still used them after that. And that Cuba had a lot of our old nuclear weapons.

It's sad that his death didn't spark more reflection on his life. No matter what negatives he brought to Russian society, he was probably the best leader they could have asked for during the time he served. And he gave us a lot of laughs, even if they were completely unintentional.

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Tuesday, April 17, 2007

The Morning After

It was kind of shocking to me that the Virginia Tech thing was such a big deal all over the world. I don't know why, but it was. I assumed it would be a big deal here because it happened at one of our "local" schools. But CNNi had it all over last night and this morning; apparently it was top news all over Europe.

What next? I think that's what everyone wants to know. Universities are trying to figure out how to keep this from happening on their campuses. But you can't do that. Conservatives are trying to link this to the fact that this guy was a foreign national. But you can't do that either. Liberals are trying to link this to lax gun control laws in Virginia. But you can't do that either. And so confusion will reign.

My parents were worried about me going off to college in Philadelphia. They thought I'd get mugged, or my dorm/apartment would be broken into, or things like that. To most people, those are the type of risks we can prevent, not some dude shooting up a classroom. Nervousness and terror are so different, but not on the surface. Getting carjacked is somewhere in between, I guess.

I'm trying to think of the scariest days of my life. September 11 was pretty bad, I guess. There were planes circling over my office building and no one knew who was on board. The month of the sniper shootings in 2002 was bad. People would put the nozzle from the gas pump into their tank and then run into the station or hide under their cars. The Home Depot that everyone saw on TV was about a mile from my apartment. That was scary.

But even with all these things, I've never experienced something in my life like those people did yesterday. Where do you even begin if that happens to you?

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

Plant update...

And as of this morning, just more cilantro. This is weird.

However, all the hostas in the backyard are up! Unfortunately for them, it's currently 50 degrees and cloudy. Poor little plants.

Tha Jerz

It was our year with the wife's family for Easter. We were in New Jersey. I haven't really spent much time in Central or North Jersey, and every time I go there, I feel like it's a good thing. The neighborhood we were in was nice enough, but I think there are more conversion vans per capita in North Jersey and New York City than anywhere else in the world. Why is this? There's also a really high number of men with moustaches. Not handlebars or anything fancy, just the plain ol.' Why?

It was the youth's first Easter. He didn't really get anything fun, except that J picked him up a toy cell phone from Carter's on Saturday morning when she and her mom went. He enjoys eating it, just like everything else. Screaming is huge right now, too. He was even screaming when he was playing by himself this morning in his crib. Next year will be the first Easter basket; he'll be 20 months old and able to enjoy it. Then the next year he's eligible for the big one: you got it, the White House Easter Egg Roll. Actually, according to that site, you can go as long as you're under 7, but I think he should wait til he's 2. The White House thing is a huge deal. A kid from my elementary school went, and we held an assembly for the entire school to see the egg. Of course, this was in a town that had 6 bowling alleys for 12,000 people and the finest dining establishment was owned by Kirk Gibson, but still. It's cool to get one of those wooden eggs.

The Most Troubling Part of Don Imus' Remarks

Without even getting into the political/racial/social impact of what he actually said, I'd like to ask where our nation's senior citizens are learning these words?

Seriously, this guy is 67 YEARS OLD. I can't imagine my parents or grandparents having the vocabulary to make a statement like this. Does he listen to hip-hop? I'm going to say no to that one without doing the background research. I don't think he hangs out with people who would say stuff like that. A large portion of his life is probably consumed with his radio show. So I'm still confused. Now onto what should happen to him.

I think that when a TV/radio personality like Imus makes a comment like this, they should be forced into oblivion. Billy Packer should be forced to suffer the same fate, even if his comments were just the antiquated use of what's today a "bad word." Suspension is just disappointing. Are these people such gods in our society that we want them back? Where are the 35-year olds waiting in the wings to force these guys out? Surely we're producing talented younger people to fill these jobs..... right?

Friday, April 06, 2007

Freezin'

Well, more cilantro is up. And still no impatiens or coleus. I'm officially concerned.

In totally unrelated news, Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul, and Mary accidentally wandered into Tony Kornheiser's house the other night. At midnight. This might be the news story of the year. He called into the show and closed the interview by singing a folk song. Bitchin'.

Holidays

Holidays, like a lot of other things, make me very introspective. It could be the whole "returning home" theme that seems to come along with them. It's depressing, exciting, a whole lot of things at once. You see a kid you were good friends with working as a checker at Target, but five minutes later, you hear how someone from your class is in some ridiculous position at Texas Instruments.
This year would be my 10 year high school reunion, but I won't be there. I'm picking one reunion (probably 20) and that's it.

About five years ago, they laid sections of new sidewalk on Pennsylvania Ave between 22nd and 23rd St. The workers bolted 2x4s to the concrete (to level it out, I guess). The 2x4s are still there. It amazes me how much has happened since the concrete was laid, and still those pieces of wood continue to waste away, totally forgotten. That's your weird, introspective thought of the day.

Thursday, April 05, 2007

Back in the Saddle

March 9 was the last post? What have all 16 of you been up to during that time?

Oh, me? Where was I? Well, still mostly home. But Michigan and St. Louis also. I planted seeds. Impatiens, coleus, and cilantro. Only the cilantro's come up. I'm a bit worried about the others. Never tried them from seed before. They've been in the little pots for about two weeks. And the weather's been so crazy. It's gone from almost 85 Monday to upper 40s today, and it might snow on Easter. Snow. On Easter. When the AVERAGE temperature is like 66, and I can remember years when it was in the 80s on Easter Sunday. Not this time. So the plants have to come in this weekend. And I need to make sure my mom moves the grapefruit tree inside tonight.

Ah, yes. I have a grapefruit tree. In Virginia. My grandma's neighbor started it from a seed when I was 10 or 11. My sister's died within a year, but mine is still going strong. It's about as tall as I am (and no, I'm not a pygmy), and the trunk is probably four inches thick. Pretty good for an ornamental. It stays at my parents' house. Outside from March to about Thanksgiving, and than it comes in for its dormancy. I'm terrified that a move will kill it, even though it is a tree with a root ball the diameter of a truck tire.

That's a little bit of this end. There's a lot more. I'd better remember to share.