Living Reflections from a Dream

as if all this horrible weather isn't enough. Tonight on NESN there is a game that makes my top 3 most horrific sports moments: Game 6 of the 1986 World Series.
The nightmare is all there to relive: McNamara, Ro-ger and his life threatening blister, Schiraldi, Stanley and poor, now somewhat deemed, Bill Buckner.

Wining it all only dulls the pain, it doesn't really make it go away..

** Update **
I have to admit I watched Game 6. What can I say.. I have a sickness and I'm baseball deprived right now. Still like a punch in the stomache. Just watching Stanley enter from the bullpen was horror inspiring. I think perhaps knowing what is going to happen almost makes it worse. I had not seen this game since it's orginal airdate. Many things I had forgotten... Marty Barrett - if we'd only won, he'd be a hero. Clemens pitch count was ungodly high. After Ro-ger, my second favorite raging Red Sox crush was Rich Gedman. He was so cute then. He looks like a middle aged suburban dad now. That is probably what he is.. but Roger still looks pretty good. Why can't they all stay that way??
Every time I see Keith Hernandez I giggle and remember when he dated Elaine?-----
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Half the fun of watching the sunday talk shows for me is how people manage to talk for minutes at a time without saying anything, or appear to say something they think people want to hear even though what they are actually going to do is completely different. Cracks me up... sometimes I laugh outloud. Like yesterday on Meet the Press, the conversation between Rep. Bill Thomas, (R-CA) and Tim Russert went something like this (after some insanity distinguishing the phrases "beating a dead horse", "dead on arrival and "barking up the wrong treee":

REP. BILL THOMAS, (R-CA): Social Security is an important issue, no potential solution is above being looked at and isn't it great that Bush is giving us the opportunity to discuss these issues.

Tim Russert: what if we tried this?

REP. BILL THOMAS, (R-CA): why would we do that?

Tim Russert: what if we tried that?

REP. BILL THOMAS, (R-CA): why would we even bother looking at that?

Tim Russert: what if we tried this, that or the other?

REP. BILL THOMAS, (R-CA): that's stupid

so, what I get out of this is: all things should be considered as long as they are solutions he likes.

ok, here are the real thing:

This morning as I'm starting up my political junky's workout (patent pending) and was watching Condi Rice's head bob on two different networks, I was appalled to discover that the local NBC station was pre-empting Meet the Press to show a Patriot's rally from Gillette (or is it Proctor & Gamble*) Stadium. Now, I know I live in a sports obsessed town (this morning I heard an ad that informed that I can't watch a dynasty in the making on a regular tv, no I need big screen, plasma, HD tv), but priorities! There is an election going on in Iraq today. The Patriots are just leaving for Jacksonville, where there is another whole week of hype to go! So I was infuriated.

That is until the rally ended and they started Meet the Press, played in it's entirety, just late. Phew! I was placated for a moment. Then John Kerry appeared spewing the same ridiculous crap that he did in his campaign. I CAN'T LISTEN TO HIM. 9/11 is why you lost the election? NO.. you ran a HORRIBLE campaign! No one really knew what you stood for. You tried to have it both ways too many times. Even I, your loyal constituent all these years who thought she knew what you stood for, got confused sometimes. If people didn't despise Bush to the core of their beings, if Bush wasn't so repugnant that people flinched at the mention of his name and would rather vote for almost anyone else on the planet, you would have been blown out of the water. TAKE SOME OWNERSHIP of this! Don't sit there and continue to go over what the Bush administration has done wrong.. let's here what you're going to do right, even if it's only in the senate. I was so enraged I had to turn up the treadmill to the fastest possible speed I can go without being thrown off the back and ending up face down on the floor, humiliated, just so I could finish my miles and not have to look at his face anymore.

* Seriously, how far away are we from The Year of the Depend Undergarments that David Foster Wallace described in Infinite Jest? Not far...-----
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The hub bub caused by my new favorite loon, James Dobson of "Focus on the Family", would have me believe. Good grief, the man (or his handlers) has way too much time on his hands if he spends his time viewing children's videos featuring sponges with no apparent sexual organs or orientation and then reading the websites of their creators just so he can complain that they say tolerance is a good thing.
> Christians issue gay warning on SpongeBob video**

Though my favorite quote on this came from Keith Olbermann last night on MSNBC:

What's next? Ernie & Bert? You might say that is way more obvious... 2 grown puppets, living together, sleeping in the same room (though supossedly in twin beds) with pictures of themselves on the walls? Hmm?? I grew up watching them and never thought twice about it. I'd bet most kids don't, either.

Stop the madness! Sadly, I fear it's just beginning. I would be optimistic about Michael Powell's resignation, but I'm preparing myself for someone worse to come in.

** when I go to this page, there is an ad on the right side for some kind of mortgage product. It looks like a ginger bread man having sex in a test tube of milk. What the fuck (yeah, I said fuck Michael Powell) is that ginger creature supossed to be doing? What does James Dobson have to say about that??-----
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building a snow fort on my porch:

Who wants to play??

Yes, I went outside.
Here I am doing my best "person you'd never want to meet in dark alley/going outside in a blizzard" outfit. Ok, the pink cranberry coat may make me less than intimidating, but if I fall into a snow bank people will find me! Well, now I have wind burn. You know that ad for frozen pizza where the people have red stripes on their faces from watching the pizza cook? That is what I look like.-----
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Today, as has happened every day since the great Blizzard of '05, the train was moving at the speed of a snail on downers. As a result the train packed to the gills, as they say. The train keeps making these jerky stop and start moves, so I�m holding on for dear life* when the woman sitting next to me begins pulling the sleeve of my coat. I look down and she says, in her best �I�m trying to be discrete, but I need to be loud enough for you and everyone else around you to hear me� voice: you�re fly is down. A fact that I had already sensed a few minutes earlier, but had done nothing about because it would be a complete operation to fix this issue. I would have to put my book back in my bag, remove my gloves, and most importantly release my grip from the pole. Now, I can�t release my grip from the pole because if I do, some other hand will take my space and the handle above is too high for me to reach. I will end up wobbling all over the place while we are jerking the whole ride. You can understand why I had made the decision that the fly was just going to have to stay down, yes? Until this woman, who was meaning to be nice, I�m sure, brought it to everyone�s attention. What does one do in this situation? Am I now forced to go through the whole rigmarole because everyone now knows? I look left, I look right. No one is making eye contact with me. I look out the window. I think about it. Nope, I�m not doing it. Zipper be damned.

* let�s see how many clich�s use in this entry, shall we?-----
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Over my blog vacation I took a number of flights, but one stood out in my mind as the most ridiculous airline experience of my life. How long have airlines been at this? Why can't they get it together? Here is the tale of my trip on American Amateur Airlines.

Picture the scene...

I'm at the end of my international journey and I'm very excited to be going home. I arrive at the airport 2 and a half hours before the flight (after having to go to the "special line" at customs on my way into the country because I couldn't remember the name of the hotel I was staying at because I didn't make the reservations, I was deemed suspicious. I suspected I would be still "suspicious" on the way back, and in fact I was. I got the whole pat down treatment.. like you read about... from a woman whose career path really should have been small town librarian. But I digress). Everything proceeds fine and eventually we board the plane.

Then we sit. And we sit and we sit.

I look up to the front and see the pilot jesturing wildly to what appears to be a maintenance man. I hear him saying: did you check the bathroom? Did you? I'm checking it myself. And he storms down the aisle.

And we sit.

He storms back up the aisle and continues jesturing to the maintenance man, who proceeds to walk off the plane. So the pilot gets on the PA and announces to us that:
- although this is the first flight of the day for this plane, the grounds crew didn't bother to service the lavatory overnight
- they apparently started to service the lavatory because the little truck that comes out to do so was attached to the plane overnight and turned on, but the didn't actually clean it out and because they left in on all night, it ran out of gas and they have to get another one.
- because it was cold, whatever was in the lavatory is partially frozen (ed. note: ewww!)
- although, techically possible, we could take off with the lavatory in this condition, he doesn't want to because if we have to tilt at all, whatever is in there and isn't frozen, could spill out and be a health hazard. (ed. note: double eww, followed by mouth hanging open that the pilot is actually telling us this)
- the maintence crew will be working on fixing this and we may see them coming through with water to "flush out the system".

People on the plane don't even discuss this turn of events as it's too gross.

10 minutes later up the aisle comes the maintenance man with a giant container of water (one of those water cooler containers that are quite heavy to turn over. If you work in an office, you know what I'm talking about). I roll my eyes.

The maintenance guy returns to the front and speaks to the pilot. The pilot seems very aggitated and again says he will "check it himself". He comes bounding down the aisle again. Then bounding back up. As he passes me I hear him muttering under his breath: that's it! I quit! I can't work like this anymore. Um, great. This is the guy I really want to be my pilot! He gets back on the PA and tells us:

- when they tried to "flush out" the lavatory, they spilled water all over the place and now we'll have to a full maintenance run down to ensure that the water hasn't seeped into whatever is below the lavatory and caused any electrical damage.
- this will take 30 minutes (the plane was already 45 min. or so delayed at this point), and we will have to deboard
- oh and: even if we get the maintenance ok, we won't be able to use the bathroom during flight, so go to the bathroom while your off the plane and don't drink any beer in the lounge. great. Alcohol may be the only way to improve this situation.

We de-board. And we sit, and we sit, and we sit.

45 minutes pass. No information is provided to us. So passengers begin to approach the desk, asking what is going on. One of the airline employees handles this fine (not, pleasant, but fine), the other one seems to be having a breakdown. After the 10th person approaches, she cracks.. yelling at them: look I'm doing the best I can! And looking like she is going to cry. I think: if you just gave us some information (and isn't that your job), no one would be bothering you.

15 more minutes pass. The flight is now an hour and 45 minutes delayed. I look out the window and spy the luggage being pulled off our plan. Crap!

10 more minutes go by and they finally announce they are cancelling the flight. The mad dash approaches the desk to get onto another flight. The next flight is full.. excellent! I must wait until the flight after which is 5 hours later (9 hours after my original flight should have taken off). Sigh...

I read half of an 800 page book that day, so I can't consider it a complete waste.. even though I almost got off the second flight when it managed to give a "love tap" to a maintenance truck as it was backing up from the gate. At that point, I was just happy that the pilot from the first flight wasn't the pilot on this flight.-----
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Interesting things I have experienced or thought recently:

• A bumper sticker declaring: Welcome to America. Now Speak English. I try to imagine the person who feels so strongly about this issue that they spend their hard earned money on such a sticker, then puts it on their car for all to see. I have no image.
• Driving behind a car which had in it's back seat a cardboard cut out of Will Ferrell (perhaps from Anchorman). The cut out was placed to make it appear as if Will were in the backseat looking out the window me.
• A woman showing her 8ish year old daughter a t-shirt and saying: see! see! Take this to heart! The t-shirt said: Real Women Don't Date Yankees Fans. Ok, this one isn't weird, just entertaining. We train 'em young up here.
• At the end of a panel on social security issues being shown on c-span, a guy from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget said something like: when social security started there were 16 workers for each retiree, now there are 2. I've picked A-Rod and Tiger for me.. everyone else is on their own. ahahhah. And people think C-span is boring.
• How newscasters will go on and on during incliment weather about not going outside... how the windchill is such and such and 5 minutes of exposure could cause frostbite, etc. With their next breath they will throw it to Rodney Reporter who has been outside covering the storm since 8am! Then you see someone doing an eskimo immitation while trying not to be blown over. All I can think is: who did that reporter piss off to get this assignment?
• Pondering why the Syracuse Orangemen's new away uniforms orange with blue writing. Don't you know you're not going to be able to see blue writing on bright orange? Couldn't they tell once they got the uniforms?
• I love that I can still see Sean McDonough calling college basketball games (though I've never heard him disclose that he is an SU alum when calling Syracuse games..) I'll miss you calling the Red Sox, Sean!
• There was a woman walking the track at my gym in regular every day clothes.. including a fur hat and a scarf.

My office is closed tomorrow... I'm like a little kid who just heard her town's name on the school cancellation list!-----
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does laundry detergent freeze after being left in the trunk of your car for a few days with temperatures around zero (because you had too much to carry and couldn't be bothered with it)??

Yes it does. Yes. it. does.-----
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I don't know what I was thinking going to the grocery store this morning. I just needed some milk! It seemed like every single person who lives within a 20 mile radius (and their screaming children) were in the store. Due to our impending blizzahhd (I'm looking a map which says 20 - 30 inches where I live... shades of '78!), you might think people would be stocking up on staples: milk, bread, etc. NO. People are madly gathered around the deli, frantically grabbing up the prepared deli platters, chips, soda, beer and more beer. Yes, it's supplies for The Game that people are concerned about.-----
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Ladies and Gentlemen, I present the door to my porch:

Yup, I can't even open the door. See how it's all white in the background? That is exactly what I see - nothing but snow and wind. I've lived in New England my whole life, with a 4 year visit to Syracuse and I've never seen anything like this. Boston Public schools have already cancelled school for Monday and Tuesday. Again.. shades of '78, when I think we had a whole week off. It was an outstanding time to be a little kid. I SO want to go outside to check it out and take pictures, but the wind is just brutal and their is a snow drift outside that appears to be taller than I am. Maybe this afternoon if things die down a bit.

So what does one do in a big time blizzard? Yesterday I watched college hoops.. practically all day. Did any of you SEE that Villanova/Kansas game? Wow. Go Big East. Then I saw Syracuse handle West Virginia and later UConn and Pitt. Another Wow game. And I wish someone would beat the crap out of BC. How can they be undefeated?? But I digress... Today I'm going read the entire Sunday paper (how impressed am I with my delivery guy getting the paper here on time and completely dry? extremely. He is getting a big tip this month), but beyond that I'm not sure. How are you spending your blizzardy day?

** Update **
What was I thinking?? I can take all the quizes I've been missing!! ;)

-----
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I sort of missed most of Dec. in terms of news as I was quite busy, but I was aware that 2004 had been deemed "Year of the Blogger" or some such nonsense. All I could think was: this is the year of the blogger? where have these people been? Now it's mainstream? I don't consider myself very cutting edge and this site has existed in some incarnation for almost 3 and a half years. This is like the way fashion takes a year or two to make it's way down to kids in junior high school. It's been hip all along, you've just noticed it or it's just become accessible to you.

You would think someone who is in the blogging world and has one the blog receiving approximately 2 billion hits, would know this also. Seems to me that it isn't only political blogs that have made their mark and that someone in the blogosphere would know that. Imagine my surprise when coming across this post on Kos (pretty well know political blogger) writes on how he thinks sports blogs are the next big thing:
Kos

My first thought was: although I read Kos, it's interesting that I first discovered this post via a link from a sports blog (cursed to first), so who's zooming who?
My second thought was: alert Theo Epstein! If Mr. Moneyball says it's so, it must be so, eh?
But mostly I thought: how can he possibly think that sports blogs aren't as evolved as political blogs? And how can want to make money off it?-----
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There I was, sitting in my office. A co-worker came in to talk to me and suddenly pointed out the window behind me and exclaims:

"Naked Men!"

I swivel around quicky and there, indeed are 2 naked guys looking out the window of a building across the street. Buff guys. Um, hel-lo!

I turn back around to my co-worker, who is waving across to them. Then I turn back to them just in time to see them pulling the curtains closed.

True story.

I've done a little investigation and discovered that the building across the street is a hotel frequented by gay men. This could a regular occurance in my life. Dare I turn my desk around to face the window?? ;)-----
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This morning in Boston it was 60 degrees. This afternoon in Boston it will drop to the 30's with a chance of snow. Even though I've lived here my whole life, I still am surprized sometimes at the weather.

* in 1996 I went to Austin and the souvenir stores were all selling t-shirts that said: This is Austin Not Boston! I'm still not exactly sure what that means, but I took it to mean they had some kind of inferiority complex regarding a northern city with a rhyming name.-----
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By now I'm sure everyone who watches more than half an hour of television a day has seen the Blockbuster ads touting their new "No Late Fees" policy and watched the crowd swoon. Wow, you may think, that is wicked awesome...

Think again.

At first I thought: so it's like Netflix (where there are no late fees)? You can just keep something out as long as you want?? Sadly, no. The policy actually is:

what does this mean? Basically, it means after 8 days, you've bought the item. If you return it between 8 and 30 days, you will be credited back for the purchase, less "restocking fees". How a restocking fee is different than a late fee is beyond me, except it probably is alot less than the previously completely unreasonable late fees charged by Blockbuster. And these terms can change at any time. Excellent.

This is all mildly annoying, but what has really got me up in arms is the little, tiny phrase at the end of the policy: "Participating stores only". Guess what.. after this huge advertising campaign, and many news stories about "No Late Fees", each store can chose to participate. So check before you rent at Blockbuster, because you could end up like someone I know who recently returned a dvd one day late and was told: you have a late fee on your account. We are not one of the participating Blockbuster stores.

Really... how stupid does Blockbuster think people are?-----
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Some of you may have noticed that I haven't been around these parts much at all lately. I had originally decided to take a weeks blog break, but then things got way beyond hectic and it became a blog leave of absence. I haven't written, nor have a been reading any blogs. According to Bloglines, I have 1329 blog posts to read and that is just personal blogs. For political blogs, I have 1069.. but even that is deceptive as it seems Bloglines stops counting at 200 unread post per blog. Lets just say... I won't be catching up.

So what have I accomplished over the last month or so??

• Traveled to a red state(!) for work and lived to tale. I was bemused to see a sign saying President Davis* once slept here.


• Spent a week in a foreign country. I knew some people outside the US have a negative perception of us, but wow.. it was brutal. Also, there is a perception that everyone in the US supports Bush because they've been told he won in a "landslide". Also, it's a little embarassing when you search out a place that may have a cable station that will allow you can see your alma mater play in a bowl game - beg a cajole to have that station put on, only to discover they are losing 49 - 6 in the third quarter. Ok, nevermind...


• In the midst of this travel managed to interview for and get a new job. Yes, a new job. Wo! I'm escaping cube life! To an office with walls and a door! Cue the Jeffersons theme song now in your head.


• Did all my Xmas shopping and got Xmas cards out in a reasonable timeframe. Minor miracle.


• Read most of:
  ok, this wasn't that hard.. it's impossible to put this book down.


• Ok, I might as well admit that I have watched game 4 and game 5 of the ACLS (all approx. 10 hours of them) again. What can I say.. it makes me happy. Speaking of the Red Sox.. NESN is playing the 1975 World Series, 1986 World Series, the 2004 ALCS and World Series again this January (see schedule). What could be better than that? (ok, I just can't watch '86... I just can't).


• I redesigned this site.. of course very few will see that as a very large percentage of people read this site do so via RSS


• What else.. I feel like I'm leaving something out. Well.. there were the holidays and all

Anyway, I'm glad to be back...

* for those not so up on their history: Jefferson Davis was the president of the confederacy.-----
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Due to your keeping the ball from the final out of the World Series (aka "ballgate"), I have gotten to see the final out and here Joe Buck say "back to Foulke. Red Sox fans have longed to hear it. The Boston Red Sox are world champions" about 20 times in the last 24 hours on the news. And it never gets old. ;)

Poor Doug. I guess the short time he has been in Boston wasn't long enough for him to realize he shouldn't trust Shaughnessy. There isn't a controversy he won't pump up to get more attention for himself, no matter how stupid it is.

I say who cares who has that ball. Let Doug keep it if it wants it.-----
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It's real, my friends, it's real! With Blizzard '05 behind us (the storm, not the snow. The snow is still here with nowhere to go) and yet another storm (5 - 8 more inches) today, nerves are frayed. Fights have broken out, tires have been slashed over people parking in spaces that someone else labored over to dig out. Public transportation is moving at a crawl.. it's every man, woman and child for themselves as they try to push themselves into the train.
I have just about had it with everybody. Yesterday, after waiting 15 min. to get out of a parking lot, I was finally approaching the exit when a massive, gas guzzling, environmentally hazardous, SUV driven by someone talking on a cell phone attempted to cut the whole line by cutting right in front of me. No way was I going to allow that just because my cute Honda was only 1/3 the size. I revved it up and recut her off. She laid on her horn as if I was in the wrong to which I responded: let me introduce you to my middle finger.
This morning I was a millisecond away from asking the woman next to me if she thought continually pushing into me was going to make me smaller or disappear altogether. Later when a woman actually pushed me out of the way to get off the train, I elbowed her. I'm not proud of my behavior, but there is only so much a person can take.

Meanwhile, I'm wondering if it's weird to have raging crushes on the local meteorologists.. How cute is Pete Bouchard? Look at his forecast.. how funny is he?