Mowing It Old School

Thanks to all the rain we’ve gotten recently, until tonight, my lawn has gone un-mowed for more than two weeks.

Because it was clear, cool and I had some time, I decided to mow tonight.  When I mow, I usually like to listen to something other than the whirring of the blades.  But I had a problem.  Usually, I’d use not-so-trusty phone, an LG VU as a music player (playing music is one of the few things the phone does well if you ignore the eternity it takes to load the music program).  But the cord that I use to link my headphones to the micro-USB slot broke.

Fortunately, I had a trusty backup that I had unearthed in the basement earlier this week: a Walkman cassette player.  I had gotten this particular Walkman sometime back when I was in high school (mid-90s) but haven’t used it at all this century.  Fortunately, all it needed were some new batteries and a tape.  I found a tape I had recorded off the radio from my junior and senior years of high school.  The tape contained songs like Undone, Buddy Holly, Einstein on the Beach, Allison Road, New Age Girl, Come Out and Play and Basket Case (most of which are also on my phone).  Also on the tape was a radio call from a May 8 1994 game between the Yankees and Red Sox in which Danny Tartabull, Mike Stanley and Gerald Williams went back-to-back-to-back (and as John Sterling likes to add “belly-to-belly-to-belly”).

The thing that struck me was during this time period, for music, I’d listen to WPST, a station out of Trenton, even though (for the most part) I lived in Staten Island, New York.  For the most part, the New York stations were too poppy and PST played mostly alt-modern rock type stuff.  Of course, these days, PST has gone through a major format change (and moved frequencies) and isn’t something I’d even listen to today.

It was weird having to switch sides on the tape (and even fast-forward physically through some commercials).  Because of the tape format, some of the songs (especially the Weezer songs I’ve heard thousands of times) seemed a bit slow.  But overall, it was an entertaining mowing session and I’ll probably use the Walkman again in the future.

I should mention that the Walkman isn’t the only ancient piece of equipment I used today.  This is our mower:

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Griffey Couldn’t Beat The Yankees This Time

April 30, 1998
Yankees 9, Mariners 8 (10 innings)

As a Yankees fan in the mid-nineties, there was one team I detested more than all others.  It wasn’t the Red Sox, the team’s historical rivals.  Nor was it the Blue Jays, who ruled baseball in the earlier part of the decade.  But rather, it was the Seattle Mariners, who beat the Yankees in heartbreaking fashion in the ’95 AL Division Series.  And on the Mariners, there was one player who I hated/feared more than all others: Ken Griffey, Jr. who destroyed the Yankees in that five game series in ’95 and always seemed to do damage whenever he was up to bat.  Besides, as an obnoxious Yankees fan, I felt Griffey was overrated, while my team’s Centerfielder, the less-flashy, but equally (if not more so) laid back Bernie Williams was underrated.

Well, earlier this week, Griffey announced his retirement.  He put up some great numbers in his day (cleanly, I might add), will surely make the Hall of Fame and while I can respect him and what he’s done, I still dislike him.  Once an obnoxious Yankees fan, always an obnoxious Yankees fan.

I remember one game in particular where, if I had not been an obnoxious Yankees fan, I would have appreciated his offensive abilities.  Unfortunately for me, he put up a few runs early on in this game.  But in the end, the Yankees somehow managed (in thrilling fashion) to defeat the hated Mariners and Griffey’s awesome display of power didn’t really matter that much.

The date was Thursday April 30, 1998.  The Yankees were wrapping up the first month of what would be their greatest season ever (or at least of my lifetime).  I was wrapping up my junior year of college.  My roomate Jon (the convert) and I should have been working on a group project for one of our classes.  Instead, we decided to head to The Stadium with our suitemate Royce to catch a Yankees game before finals started.  Because it was a mid-week game, the Stadium wasn’t near being sold out and we managed to get seats in the lower level on the third base side.

David Wells, who was erratic early on in the ’98 season started for the Yankees.  He gave up four runs in six innings, two of them to Griffey, who hit two home runs (with future Yankee Alex Rodriguez adding his own home run).  Despite the fact that the Mariners struck first, the Yankees showed up to play, with the lead see-sawing back and forth until it was 7-4 Yankees going into the eighth.  In the eighth, Mike Stanton gave up four runs, before Darren Holmes (“that young man from Colorado,” who seemingly was behind a number of Yankees losses early in the season) shut the Mariners down.  The game went into extra innings thanks to a Tim Raines solo shot in the bottom of the ninth.

Mariano Rivera quieted the Mariners in the top of the tenth.  In the bottom of the inning, Tino Martinez singled in Chuck Knoblauch to seal a win for the Yankees, sending the crowd home very happy.  Despite Griffey’s two home runs, the Yankees came out on top.  Griffey would only be in the league for another season and a half and the Mariners never really again struck fear into the hearts of Yankees fans.

As Griffey put up Hall of Fame numbers, our Centerfielder won four World Series rings.  I’d rather have Williams’ career.  But then again, I’m an obnoxious Yankees fan.

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Baby Wardrobe Malfunctions

Last fall, a few weeks after The Civee and I found out we were having a baby, we were walking through the baby section of Target and saw this onesie (and yes, that’s a technical term) that had a dinosaur playing a guitar, exclaiming ‘You Rock.’  We thought that it was cute and decided that boy or girl, our child would look good in it.

Well, Hope has outgrown all her newborn clothes and is now onto the three-month size (even though she’s a little more than six weeks old) so The Civee and I figured now would be a good time to have her wear the very first thing we ever bought for her.  As you can see in the picture, she was quite happy to be wearing it (she smiles all the time and it’s pretty cool).  Some people have commented that the outfit is nice, but because it’s blue and gray, it’s not really girly.

I’m still trying to wrap my head around what that means.  Hope has a lot of pink, red and purple clothes and looks really good in them.  But there’s nothing wrong with her diversifying her color palette. Besides, as she is one of the world’s youngest Yankees fans, I’d much rather have her wear the traditional Yankee colors than one of pink outfits with a pink interlocking NY (even though she has one of those too).

So people think that the blue and grey isn’t girly enough.  But the guitar-playing dinosaur is really cool.  And that’s another thing with most of the girls clothes out there.  Go to any baby clothing aisle and (besides the color) you’ll notice a tremendous difference between the boy’s clothes and the girl’s clothes.  The girl’s shirts often have messages like “I’m So Cute” or “Mommy’s Little Sweetie” or “Future Princess” written on the front.  On the other hand, the boy’s shirts have things like “You Rock” or “Little Fire Chief” or “Future Rocket Scientist.”  Notice anything different here?  While there’s nothing wrong with exclaiming a baby’s cuteness, why should my daughter feel unladylike if her parents wish to proclaim the possibility that one day, she could be a rocket scientist, fire chief or rock star?

And as I mentioned, the dinosaur playing the guitar is really cool.

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Goodbye Jack Bauer, A Nation Turns Its Back on You

Back during Season 1 of 24, each episode would start with a voiceover by Jack in which he declared the events of that day to be the longest day of his life.

Nine years (our time, not his) and eight seasons of 24 later, Jack might dispute that assertion (or at least say he had eight really long, bad days).  Despite the changes in presidential administrations, CTU staff and nefarious villains, one constant has remained: Jack Bauer will put himself on the line for what is right.

And here he is today, at the end of his eighth longest (and final) day.  The U.S. government is in turmoil, a foreign government he nearly decapitated will be gunning for him and Jack Bauer is a man without a country.  Hardly the thanks one would get for putting ones life on the line.

But Jack Bauer would have it no other way.

Continue reading “Goodbye Jack Bauer, A Nation Turns Its Back on You” →

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Lost: One Last Time

Way back when I first started watching Lost, I was drawn to the show because of all the mysteries.  While the characters were somewhat interesting, I watched because I wanted to find out more about the Island.  As the seasons progressed, sure, I liked the characters, but I wanted to learn more about things like the DHARMA Initiative, the smoke monster and the frozen donkey wheel.

Well, tonight was Lost’s final episode.  And not all of my questions have been answered.  But the finale was so emotionally satisfying, especially for the show’s characters that I find myself not caring about the mysteries.

Funny how these things work.

Continue reading “Lost: One Last Time” →

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It Only Ends Once

Twenty-four hours from now, one of my favorite television shows will start its final episode.

While other people have expressed despair about LOST ending, I’m not feeling it.  I know I’ll miss the show once it’s not on the air every week from January through May.  But this is a day that I’ve been waiting for since I watched the first episode on DVD during the summer of aught-five.  Some questions will be answered, but more importantly, the story of Jack, Locke, Desmond, Sawyer, Hurley, Ben and all the rest will be over.  I’m not glad that it’s over, but I’m glad that we’re at the end of the story (if that makes any sense).

To prepare for the final episode, I’m going into a blackout mode.  Since I first got into Lost, I’ve followed other Web sites (like DarkUFO and DocArzt).  But because the end is so soon, and apparently, spoilers are out there, I’m enacting radio silence (or, more accurately, Web invisibility) until after tomorrow’s episode.  I’ve been spoiled for things in the past, but I want to go into tomorrow with a blank slate.

I really don’t have any theories as to how it will all end.  While I’m not as hostile to the Sideways universe as I was at the beginning of Season Six, I hope the story ends on the Island in the universe we’ve been watching these six years.  It would be great to get some more answers to the questions we’ve had along the way, but if they don’t answer everything, I’m cool with that.

I did have one thought the other day- Desmond and Jack first met in a stadium following Jack’s performing surgery on Sarah and had the following exchange:

DESMOND: Ah, a girl, right?

JACK: A patient.

DESMOND: Ah, but a girl patient. What’s her name?

JACK: Her name’s Sarah.

DESMOND: What’d you do to her then?

JACK: Do to her?

DESMOND: You must have done something worthy of this self-flagellation.

JACK: I told her — I made a promise I couldn’t keep — I told her I’d fix her and I couldn’t. I failed.

DESMOND: Well, right. Just one thing — what if you did fix her?

JACK: I didn’t.

DESMOND: But what if you did?

JACK: You don’t know what you’re talking about, man.

DESMOND: I don’t? Why not?

JACK: Because with her situation that would be a miracle, brother.

DESMOND: Oh, and you don’t believe in miracles? Right. Well then, I’m going to give you some advice anyway. You have to lift it up.

JACK: Lift it up?

DESMOND: Your ankle. You’ve got to keep it elevated. It’s been nice chatting.

JACK: Jack.

DESMOND: Jack, I’m Desmond. Good luck, brother. See you in another life, yeah?

You have to lift it up. In the Sideways universe, the Island is at the bottom of the ocean.  What if all Jack has to do is lift it up?  Stupid idea, but I just thought I’d share.

If you’re a Lost fan, I hope you enjoy tomorrow as much as I do.  If you’ve never seen the show, it’s not too late to start watching.  I may not have a post up until much later after the finale, but I’m sure I’ll have some sort of reaction.

See you in another life.

King Tom

That One With The Ice Planet, The Green Muppet and Lobot

I didn’t realize this earlier (if I had, this entry would have been posted yesterday, instead of today), but yesterday, May 21, 2010 was the 30th anniversary of the release of The Empire Strikes Back.

Now I feel old.

I was born in ’77, the year Star Wars came out.  I don’t have exact memories, but I have flashes of memories of seeing Star Wars in the theaters (and back then, it was in the theaters for years, not weeks like the movies of today) a few different times.  I was hugely into Star Wars as a kid.  But for some reason it took me a while to see Empire.  But unlike with Episode IV, I do remember the first time I saw Empire.

It was actually a few years after it came out- sometime in April or May of ’83, right before Return of the Jedi (which I saw on its opening night in a drive in, but that’s another story).  In that spring of ’83, I was five and after seeing several commercials for Jedi, my father knew that I needed to see Empire before seeing Jedi.

Or else I would have been spoiled big-time.

So King Classic found a theater somewhere in North Jersey that was having a double feature of Star Wars and Empire back to back.  And it was on a Friday.  So my father took me out of kindergarten that day, sat through Star Wars for yet another time with me and then also sat through Empire with me.

As a five-year-old, the movie blew my mind.  And it still continues to do so, probably because I gotten it more as I’ve aged.  I have to say that Star Wars and Empire are tied for first on my favorite movie list (followed closely by UHF), but I do have a better story for the first time I saw Empire.  And maybe because I saw it two years after it came out, I shouldn’t feel so old.

King Tom

Lost: What They Died For

It wasn’t supposed to be him.

If, way back during Lost Season 1, you were to go through all of the survivors of Oceanic 815 and pick one to be the protector of the Island for all eternity, the smart money would have been on John Locke.  Locke believed in the power of the Island and experienced its benefits first hand.  The actions he took were to explore the Island and learn about its secrets.  Locke’s main rival, Jack Shepard was everything Locke was not.  Rather than believing that the Island was some special place, he was focused on escaping it and getting back to his life.  The protector of the Island was supposed to be John Locke.  Jack Shepard was supposed to leave the Island and save those who needed to be saved off of it.

Yet here we are.  Six seasons later, with What They Died For, the second-to-last episode of Lost.  John Locke as we know him is dead,  A quasi-immortal centuries-old being is using his likeness.  And Jack Shepard, who was willing to go to “war” to get off the Island, experienced hell off it, traveled through space and time to get back and now willingly accepted the mantle of Island protector.

Congratulations Jack Shepard.

Continue reading “Lost: What They Died For” →

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A Month of Hope

The Civee and I can’t believe it: we’ve kept our daughter Hope alive for a month!

The past month has certainly been different for us- having to arrange our schedule around her and paying attention to every single little cry to tell if she needs food, to be changed, or just wants our attention.  But it’s been a lot of fun.  We have this little person who’s developing her own personality.  She can smile (we think), lift her head up and give us some serious eye contact.  She also likes to go out with mom and dad.  The Civee and I have taken her to all sorts of places and not once has she caused a scene (so far).

If I had one complaint, it would be that everyone who says babies sleep 16 hours per day was lying.  Because whenever it’s my time to watch Hope late at night, she’s wide awake.  Of course, it could just be she wants to hang out and watch Sledge Hammer! and Lost with me.  And I’m perfectly fine with that.

The surprising thing (to me) is that I haven’t dropped her or forgotten her anywhere.  There’s still time to do that, but with each day, I get a little better at this parenting thing.

 

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