A Baseball Complaint

Regular readers of this space know just how far in the tank I am for the game of baseball. Many of you don’t get it because you’re football people and that’s fine. Some of you are charmed by my love of baseball, considering it part of my eccentricity that I would be so fond of a game that has fallen from being the national pass time 50 years ago to an October annoyance today. That’s fair. But even I, especially someone like me, has earned the right to air a complaint about the game I love. Watching night after night of playoff baseball has brought this issue to the table and it’s time for a public airing.

Ok, one of the charms of this game is the fact that there is no time clock. Some games that are well-pitched can be over in less than 2 hours. Others, with errors and lots of runs can last much longer. Plus, in baseball there’s always the possibility of extra innings since we never play for ties. I love this about baseball. You go to a game and for the first time all week time is finally on your side, no deadlines, no glancing at the clock on the wall. You can actually have a conversation at a baseball game. The pace of the game isn’t break neck like the rest of the world. If I want manic I’ll go to work. Two minute drill? I’m sorry, that sounds like something the dentist does to you when he is really pissed off. However, having said all of this, a relatively modern baseball invention is testing my patience…the batting glove.

95% of players today wear not one, but TWO batting gloves. These leather and nylon menaces have done more to slow down the pace of play than anything since the introduction of the commercial break. It goes something like this. Hitter approaches the batters box. Before entering the box he tugs on the wrist band of each glove and stretches it tight until the Velcro patch locks it at the desired level of security. Then and only then does he step into the box, ready to hit. The pitcher peers in for the sign, gets the one he wants and fires a first pitch fastball that misses the outside corner. The umpire calls out “ball one”. Then, inexplicably the batter steps out of the box. For what reason, you might ask? Well, he must now refasten both of his batting gloves. But, why?? How could they possibly have become any looser from the violent torque involved in TAKING A PITCH!!!! This maddening habit of modern players is starting to get under my skin. First of all, how could Willie Mays, Mickey Mantle, Hank Aaron, and Ted Williams have hit all of those home runs without batting gloves? Do guys like Mark Raynolds, Adam Dunn and Danny Espinosa need batting gloves so that can strike out over 200 times in a single season? I guess I should be thankful that Nomar Garciaparra has retired. Old Nomar raised batting glove adjustment to an art form with the Tourette Syndrome-esk nervous tick of a train wreck that he ran out there after every pitch. Before leaving Boston he corrupted an otherwise fine player, Dustin Pedroia, with the same affliction. Sadly, it has spread like wild fire to almost every player in the game. Now it’s…step in box, take pitch, adjust batting glove, repeat. ARRGGHHH!!!

While I’m at it. Modern pitchers need to get a hold of some game tape of guys like Jim Kaat and Mel Stottlemyer, or any pitcher who hung up his cleats before the incorporation of ESPN. Those guys would get the ball from the catcher, maybe rub it up for two seconds, then fire it back. Their view was, they preferred to rush the hitter, to set the tempo, THEIR tempo. Now, pitchers are like human rain delays with all of their walking around the mound, grounds keeping duties, and irritating multiple shake-offs of sign after sign. The other night when Ryan Voglesong was pitching for the Giants, I swear, I thought I would throw something at my flat screen. PITCH THE BALL ALREADY FOR GOD”S SAKE!!!! I mean, the calm, rational, pastoral nature of the game is wonderful and all but when it’s 11:30 at night and a 1-1 ballgame is only in the bottom of the fourth inning?

You know what would be fun? How about doing a little time travel back to the early sixties. I introduce Mickey Mantle to the modern batting glove and convince him that the wrist straps MUST be adjusted after every pitch, whether he swings the bat or not. Then I watch him step into the box against Bob Gibson. What would be the chances of Mickey getting beaned if he stepped out to readjust his batting glove after taking a pitch? I’d say 100%.

It's Pam's World. I'm Just Living In It.

Like so many members of the human race, I am a creature of habit. In particular, my morning routine has taken on epic levels of monotony. I rise at 6:30. I walk down the stairs and let Molly out the back door. While she performs her own morning ritual, I begin a pot of coffee. After loading the machine, I reach into the middle jar on the counter and remove one dog biscuit. I open the back door where Molly is patiently, knowingly, waiting, slip the biscuit into her mouth as she comes back into the house. Then I sit on the love seat browsing the internet on my iPhone waiting for the coffee to brew. It’s the sort of rhythm that I have built into my life and it is oddly comforting.

I say all of this to demonstrate for you how dependable and reliable these routines are to me, and also so that you will then understand how remarkably pliable an attitude I have adopted when my wife chooses randomly to throw me a curveball.

Roughly 6 weeks ago I awoke one day and was effortlessly trudging through my morning rituals. I stepped into the shower and began shampooing my hair, then moved on, dreamlike, to shaving, then to rinsing off. I stepped out of the shower, grabbed my towel from the hook on the back of the door where it always hangs, as inflexible as the laws of physics. Then I reached for the blow dryer where it hangs from the suction cup hook on the large mirror. My hand grabbed air. Startled, I stepped back and noticed that the blow dryer along with the hook was gone. I must have stood there, mouth agape staring at the mirror for a minute or more. What could possibly have happened to it? I was at a total loss as to what to do next. Pam was still asleep and doesn’t do well when abruptly awakened. I searched the cabinets under both sinks. No blow dryer. We hadn’t just returned from a trip so she couldn’t have left it in a suitcase. It was just gone.

Then I remembered that two days ago, after Kaitlin had returned back to graduate school, I had found Pam in one of her scorched earth style cleaning jags. She had taken everything out of the kids bathroom down the hall and scrubbed the place within an inch of it’s life. The idea occurred to me that maybe she had taken the blow dryer into the kids bathroom and left it by mistake. I walked down the hall and around the corner and discovered that Pam hadn’t merely left the blow dryer there, she had found it a new home. There it was in all of it’s 2000 watt beauty, hanging smartly from my missing hook in it’s new spot on the mirror over Patrick’s sink.

That was 6 weeks ago. It’s still in there. Pam hasn’t said a word about it and even worse, I haven’t either. So each and every morning after toweling off, I walk naked down the upstairs hall past our giant palladium window hoping there’s nobody standing on the front porch with their hands cupped around their eyes peering inside to see if anyone’s at home. I should say at this point that I’m not a robe type of guy. I mean I’ve tried them but they’re not for me. So every morning I pause at my bedroom door, peer around the corner to make sure the coast is clear, then I walk down the hall to use the blow dryer.

How did this happen? How did I sit passively by and allow my wife to alter the physical reality of my daily routine without even a whisper of protest? Well, here’s the thing, this house belongs to Pam. Yes, I know, I had it built, and I’m the one basically paying for it, but this place is her domain. After 28 years of marriage I have learned a few things. First of all, if she decides to move the location of the blow dryer, then…well, there must be an awfully good reason for doing so. Asking her to explain her reasoning would be like asking your mother why the sky is blue, or why it is that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west and not the other way around. At the end of the day, it doesn’t really matter!

So, now I have a new routine. Honestly, I’ve already gotten used to it. If after a few months I wake up one day and she’s moved it to the mirror in the downstairs bathroom, then I’ll know that she’s just messing with me. For now, we’re good. It’s all good.

Let Us Celebrate a Season

It’s cold and wet outside. Acorns have browned my yard. It looks like someone dumped a box of marbles beneath every tree on the property. I can skate to the mailbox on a river of organic ball bearings.

 The leaves on the trees are beginning to glow around the edges with color, and now they fall with more urgency, in a hurry to be somewhere, preparing for something. The sun is starting to hang lower in the sky, and disappears a tick earlier each night. 

My house has taken on the smell of pumpkin spice. Touches of yellow, red, and burnt orange have appeared on end tables and around the fireplace. Soon, there will be hot biscuits and white chicken chili.

Long sleeves have made an appearance. I find myself searching the closets and drawers for thicker, warmer clothes. There’s a chill in the air every morning. Friday nights bring the distant rumble of Godwin’s marching band.

College GameDay. Cars and trucks begin sprouting tattered flags that flap in the breeze at stoplights. Virginia Tech, Virginia, and an occasional stubborn, weary Penn State.

 Meteorologists begin to speak darkly about the patterns or wind currents that might portend a harsh winter. We put such talk out of our minds. Winter will come soon enough. But now we have autumn, and that’s enough.

Let us rejoice and be glad in it.

The House of Blues and Coming Home

The House of Blues was more like the House of Bluefish. Apparently, every other year at these things, the meeting is intentionally located in a Midwestern city so that on the final night’s extravaganza, throngs of home office folks can be bussed in for the big night. Therefore, a facility that can comfortably accommodate 500 revelers was packed sardine-like with 700. The buffet line took 30 minutes, and by the time I reached the food, the large dinner plates were gone replaced with cocktail plates the size of a 1966 Volkswagon Beetle hubcap. Demonstrating Olympian fine motor skills, I managed to balance three such hubcaps on my left forearm, making my way up to the Horizon suite overlooking the huge dance floor. From there it was a great view if one wanted to merely observe the proceedings. But tonight I was feeling especially claustrophobic. I decided to wander the building all night.

This place was an anthropologist’s dream. An open bar, combined with 700 people hundreds of miles away from home on the last night of a 4 day getaway is must see TV. Many of the home office folks helpfully wore yellow golf shirts and bright cheerful name tags. This came in handy at the end since these marks of identification made it much easier for the authorities to heard them all up. I exaggerate slightly of course, but suffice it to say they were not in Iowa anymore. The most hilariously uninhibited dancers?…the yellow shirts. The loudest screamers when the band exhorted the crowd to sing along to “ You Make Me Wanna Shout!”?…yellow shirts. The most appreciative of the open bar?…well, you get the picture.

The band was awesome. They were a party band called “Big Fun” and they lived up to their name. Four black vocalists and a rocking tight band, sort of like a cross between the Temptations, the Supremes, and Earth Wind and Fire. I had fun, but must admit to an odd ambivalence I always feel at such events when I am without my wife. I am of the opinion that there are places in this world where one should not be without one’s spouse. It was no sin to be there without her, but it felt like it was in the neighborhood. It’s probably just me.

So, this morning, I sit in the Marriott hotel café eating my $11 dollar bagel and killing time before my flight home. Nobody from Cambridge informed any of us that the Chicago marathon was being run today, with all 48,000 runners streaming down Michigan Avenue until 11 o’clock, blocking our exit from the hotel. On the street in front of me almost every runner I see is white, but as I glance up at the TV monitor at the live coverage, the camera is focused on a breakaway pack of 8 Kenyans. Where is Jesse Jackson lecturing us about the need for affirmative action when you need him? Oh, did I mention that it’s 39 degrees out?

All in all my four days in Chicago were nice. But, I am ready to be home, ready to see Pam, ready to sleep in my own bed. Actually, I was ready two days ago.

Day Three. Jeff Baxter and a Godfather Reference

By 9:35 of Day three, my purpose for being in Chicago ended. I attended my fourth and final required firm element presentation. In a rational world, I would have then grabbed a snack in the lobby just before hailing a cab for the airport. I would have gotten home around 2 o’clock yesterday afternoon in time to take in a movie with my wife. But no, I don’t live in a rational world. You see, in my world, my Broker-Dealer, as a reward for my production, has graciously agreed to pay for three of the four nights I am in Chicago. In addition they have generously promised a daily stipend to help me with the cost of living in this fabulous city for four days and nights. Unfortunately, there’s a catch, and for you young people in my reading audience…there’s ALWAYS a catch. In order for me to actually collect these generous offerings from my fine Broker-Dealer, I must stay for the entire conference, all four nights. So if I leave a day early, I would save the $200 bill from the hotel, but give up roughly $750 in subsidies.

Now when I first learned of this arrangement, I figured there must have been a vitally important function on Saturday night that the big brass wanted to make sure everybody attended, thus the odd early departure penalty. Perhaps they would be announcing some grand new initiative that will transform the business. Maybe something darker was planned. Maybe they were planning to announce the sale of the Broker-Dealer to Solyndra or MySpace, achieving the ultimate synergy of combining irrelevant business models. But, it turned out that I had nothing to worry about. The crucial event planned for Saturday was a night at……The House Of Blues. Apparently, Cambridge has exclusive use of the facility. There will be dinner and I assume a headliner act to entertain us through the night. But, knowing these people like I do, a part of me is still worried. The headquarters of Cambridge is after all, in Fairfield, Iowa. Although possessed of bedrock values and impossibly friendly people, Fairfield isn’t exactly known for it’s cutting edge hipness. I still worry that what the brass have in mind is a lively evening of Karaoke.

So, after my 9:30 meeting yesterday I spent the day working out, walking the streets of Chicago and attending a spare presentation or two. Jeff, the skunk, Baxter redeemed the day. With his Stratocaster in tow, he gave a mind blowing talk about the similarities between the musical creative process, and the problem solving skills required of missile defense scientists…or something like that. He deftly mixed in smart jazz rifts of “My Old School” with vignettes of his work at the Pentagon working with four star generals and military intelligence officials struggling to write syllabuses for nuclear weapon protocols. Mind blown.

Last night we had dinner at an Italian restaurant that reminded me a little of the one in The Godfather where Michael murders Bazinni and McClousky. Great food, and nobody ended up sleeping with the fishes.

Chicago. Day Two. Joe Gibbs is cool.

Day two was beautiful. The fog lifted and the mist was gone. The sun was out all day bringing a light wind and a warm 70 degrees. Once the veil was lifted I saw the beautiful city I remembered from 10 years ago. Unfortunately, yesterday was the busiest day of the week, so I didn’t get to enjoy the weather much. I heard four different speakers/presentations. They varied from pedestrian business drivel to positively terrifying.

The terrifying one came from a guy who I see all the time on Squawk Box, CNBC and Fox Business News, I forget his name, Greg something or other. Anyway, he’s a very well connected financial guy with lots of friends at the Fed and elsewhere in Washington. He touched on quite a few heavy subjects like Monetary policy, the pending fiscal cliff coming January one, the impact of the election on the stock market and vice versa, and he ended with Geo-politics, specifically the Iran v. Israel battle upcoming over Iran’s pending nuclear capabilities. After listening to this guy I was ready to pack up the family, head to Montana and start working on that bomb shelter I’ve been putting off. Then Joe Gibbs walked in.

This 70 year old man, three-time Super Bowl winning coach, and then three-time Nascar championship car owner was a delight. He’s no professional speaker to be sure, his delivery was halting and at times repetitive. But, his sunny disposition and beaming smile was infectious. I could have listened to his Redskins stories all night, even though I truly loathe that franchise and always have. But I can’t not love Joe Gibbs. After his speech my partner Bland, a lifelong and truly obnoxious Redskin fan, the kind who is insufferable when they win and even more insufferable when they lose, insisted that I help him track down Joe through the throng of autograph seekers who had descended on him as he walked off the stage. Bland didn’t have a camera, you see, so my iPhone would do nicely. For several intensely embarrassing moments I felt like an evil combination of paparazzi and groupie, but Bland would not be denied. Once we cornered the poor guy, who couldn’t possibly have been nicer or more accommodating, even offering to let Bland wear his Super Bowl ring for the picture. I snapped the picture, posted it on Facebook and now Bland can die a happy man. He owes me…..BIG TIME.

Chicago. Day One

Giordano’s Pizza is famous in Chicago. I had some yesterday. Wow. Then I was forced to return to the hotel and hit the treadmill for 3 miles out of fear that had I not, I would have been dead by sundown. It’s the sort of food that you instinctively know is terribly bad for you, but it tastes so danged good, you can’t stop yourself. Our waiter reminded us that, “We deliver our pizza’s frozen anywhere in the world in 24 hours. Just pop it in the oven for an hour and it’s done.” I resisted the urge to join the “Pizza-A-Week” club.

So far I haven’t seen much of Chicago. I took a long walk down Michigan Avenue but the fog was so thick I could only see 10 stories or so of each 50 story building. The view from my 22^nd floor window is of the lovely air-conditioners on the roof of the Chicago Harley Davidson building. Last night at the welcome cocktail party/dinner I stood in various long lines for ten minutes each to be treated to tiny plates full of appetizers. There was a Greek salad station, an egg roll station, a pasta station, and a station that featured tiny, half dollar sized pizzas. Giordano’s need not worry about the competition.

Then it was off to watch the Presidential debate. I spent the entire time texting back and forth with my son, no Romney fan he. According to the Twitter chatter from his decidedly liberal buddies, Obama got schooled. The best part was watching the pundit class afterwards. From their expressions you would have thought that all of their children had been abducted at the same exact moment that they received word that their mothers had all passed away. Over on PBS poor David Brooks was positively pail at the shock of having just seen the man with the best pants crease in history get mauled by someone named Mitt. George Stephanopoulos looked as though he was ten seconds away from the first live vomit in the history of television news. Chris Matthews was reduced to blaming Obama’s dismal performance on the fact that he doesn’t watch enough MSNBC. Haven’t seen the news this morning but I’m sure at some point today some liberal will remind us that the near unanimous conclusion that Romney won the debate is more proof of how irredeemably racist America remains.

OK, now it’s time to get down to business. From 8:30 to 12:30 I will listen to the wise men at Cambridge tell me how great it is to be in Chicago at a hotel that charges me $14.95 per day for internet. Which explains why I am typing this at 6:30 in the bar of the lobby. Free WiFi. Are you kidding, I could buy half of a medium Giordano’s pepperoni and sausage for that. Psshht!