Brief Glimpse

As noted yesterday, FOX did show the Phillies – Giants game here locally. I can understand it though, as the “local” MLB team of interest is the Atlanta Braves and they are in the same division as the Phillies, so the Braves fans could watch and root against them (they better root hard as the Braves trail the Phils by 9 games in the standings.)

So I listened to the game on the radio, all except for an inning of the Sox – Yankees game that FOX broadcast as bonus coverage. That bonus coverage was due to the difference in the style of play in the two different leagues, the National League tangos and the American League waltzes. The Phillies and Giants are in the NL and those guys play like they have someplace that they want to go to after the game. Their game was finished in 2 hours and 14 minutes. The Yankees & Red Sox play are in the AL where it seems like they have no place they would rather be than on the baseball diamond, so it took them 3 hours and 25 minutes to play those same nine innings.

The FRS scored first, 2 runs in the bottom of the third inning. The MFY came right back and scored 2 in the top of the fourth to tie the game. I almost turned off the broadcast because because I had a feeling that the Red Sox were going to lose this game too. Lucky for me their attitude was better than mine as the Sox then answered back in the bottom of the 4th with 5 runs. The Yankees never got close again and lost 10-4.

Donna and I along with friend Joan went for a 4-1/2 mile walk in Hitchcock Woods this morning. We were in the Woods for a little over two hours and saw 2 different people walking 2 dogs each, three high school cross country runners and three folks on horseback. Busy day.

Am I Fan Enough?

Its a showdown at the Fenway Corral and I can’t stand it. We went grocery shopping tonight and when I got home the Sox were up 2 to 0 on the Yankees. My wife said, “Your team is winning, you should be happy.” But as a lifelong Red Sox fan I know that doom is just around the corner and sure enough, the very next inning the the MFY scored three runs and are now in the lead.

I gave up on the FRS last night when they were down by three with three chances to make it up against the Indians. I’ll hang on tonight with three innings left because they are down by one and because it is the Yankees, but I don’t know if I can stand it much longer. The pitching is killing me. They just walked the number 9 hitter after getting two outs. Come on, the #9 batter is in that part of the order for a reason, he’s the weakest hitter in the line-up, quit nibbling the corners and throw the ball in there. The offense isn’t helping matters either, in the fifth inning they had the bases loaded and the “best” hitter in the American League, Adrian Gonzales, struck out. In the sixth the tying run was left on second base and in the seven they went down one – two – three.

After tonight’s audible torture, I’m in for some visual tormenting the next two days as the games will be on TV, FOX on Saturday afternoon and* because the game will be ESPN on Sunday night.

* Just checked the TV Listings online and it looks like the local FOX affiliate will be showing the Phillies – Giants game. Maybe it will be raining in San Francisco tomorrow afternoon.

I Missed You Guys Yesterday

We got home from work yesterday and were surprised to find we had no new email. We then realized there was no internet access. That explains that. I went into the living room and turned on the TV, nothing but snow. Because I already had an errand to run and the Cable Co office is like a 1/2 mile away, I opted to stop by instead of dealing with voice mail hell.

The woman at the office tried some things with no success, so we set up a repair appointment for today. When I got home I went over to check the junction box and what do do know, cable wires coming out, but nothing going in. I looked up at where the cable runs through a hook on the soffit and the hook was bent straight. Odd, the junction box nor the splitter inside looked damaged, did someone need a 100′ of coaxial cable? I walked to the street, crossed it and walked up to the pole where the cable comes from. Somebody didn’t steal the cable, it still headed up the pole and the length of the cable was neatly coiled at the base.

Tuesday was trash day and I figured that the truck the city uses to pick up the yard waste, AKA: The Jaws of Death, most have somehow yanked it down while picking up vegetable matter from in front of the house across the street. I called the Cable Co and let them know what I had discovered.

Today at 12:30 a tech called me at work to tell me he was just leaving my house and he let me know he replaced the cable from pole to home as it had a couple of squirrel induced damage spots. He could see my modem was online with his computer, so he figured he had the thing fixed, but to give a call if when we got home the TV wasn’t working (it was.) He modified my theory of the incident slightly because the cable end wasn’t damaged and it makes a lot of sense. The truck probably hit the cable just enough to yank it out of the hook on the soffit, leaving it dangling low across the street. A city worker probably manually disconnected it from the splitter and rolled it up under the pole so as not to endanger any traffic on the street. It sure would have been nice if they reported the issue to the Cable Co, the issue might have even been fixed before we got home…

Off Roading

We ran a couple errands after work today, the last of which was to pick up our evening meal, a buy one get one free spaghetti dinner. Trouble came when we left the restaurant parking lot, home was to the left and making a left on this road at this time of day is nearly impossible, so I made a right. Then I hung a quick left on a road I have passed by a zillion times, but had never driven. When I got to the next stop sign I realized where I was. Back to the right was a road I had already traveled on the way to the restaurant and away from home. To the left and towards home was a dead end with a little dirt spur that dumped out behind Walmart.

I went left. The little dirt spur was in a lot worse shape than I remembered. The pot holes were separated by not much of level and because of the recent afternoon thunderstorms, filled with dirty brown water. Slow and careful driving allowed me to keep most of the wheels out of the divots. Then to top it off, the final obstacle was a curb to drive down off of to get back to pavement. Thank goodness we weren’t in the Miata.

The Purple Whale got a deserved bath after the spaghetti dinner.

Car Free Sunday

We slept in a little this morning and then got on the tandem for a bike ride before the weather got stinking hot. We rode a long looping 15 miles before ending up at the west side DD for our usual. By the time we were done we had gone 22 miles and change. After parking the bike and closing the garage door, neither of us ventured outside again.

We watched the last 2 episodes of Season Eight of Law & Order: The Mother Ship on a DVD from Netflix with lunch. This disc was the end in two different ways, first, it marks our return to one DVD out at a time from Netflix and secondly, Season 8 is the last of L&O seasons of the 20 that is available for rental (except for inexplicably, season fourteen.) The afternoon was spent watching the FRS beat the CWS on TBS. And tonight, well, when do you think I’m writing this.

Three For Three

We ate for the Trifecta. Breakfast at Autens where we were too early to for the annual pancake eating contest. Lunch at Chick-fil-A where the parking lot was full, the drive-up window line was long, but inside the service was surprisingly fast. Dinner was at Zorbas Pizza and Grill where the food was spectacularly mediocre for the price they charged for it.

Dinner with the MMC at Zorbas was a prelude to the Annual Bug Splat Rally and for only the second time in its 13 year history no one went home with the Biggest Bug trophy. I skipped 2002 for some reason and this year, as I alluded to in Friday’s post, no one hit a bug, let alone a big one. In an effort to make sure he didn’t take home the trophy, one member wrote the word bug on the green Avery dot on another car and another member, a past winner, said even if he did actually win the trophy, his wife would not let him back in the house with it. So, awaiting next year’s run, the trophy sits in a place of honor at our house; on top of the water heater in the laundry room at the back of the garage.

Started down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1052

Bugless Splat?

Saturday is the MMC’s Annual Bug Splat Rally and this year we have added an extra zig and corresponding zag to the route. Monday we ran about half of the route to see how the extra roads worked out and last night we ran the whole thing to make sure that my mileage numbers on the route map were correct. Before we started I didn’t really make sure the nose of the car was squeaky clean, but at the completion of both runs the nose of the Emperor did not have seem to have any real new splats on it. Maybe the very dry, very hot weather has really decreased the insect population around here.

There are 4 prizes up for grabs on the Bug Splat Rally, Biggest Bug (winner gets an awesome trophy), Closest To The Target, Most Bugs and Cleanest Car. If the insect total tomorrow is anything like this past Monday and Thursday one car could win those first three prizes and the rest of the participants will all be tied for the Cleanest Car Award.

Started up, went down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 1050