This post is a continuation of my previous post. I probably won't have time to finish my Friday story tonight, but I would like to write a little bit before going to bed.
So, after we got on the boat, Peter calmed down a bit. In fact, he was quite excited to be on a boat, and he dragged me by the hand to the top deck of the boat ( Ruth stayed below deck with Michael - she tends to get sea-sick on boats ). As we sat there on the to deck, we had one of those little moments that makes all the stress of parenthood worth it. We had a great view of both the Bay Bridge and the Golden Gate Bridge from the our seats, and we could also see a bunch of sailboats. Peter drank it all in and his little eyes lit up. He kept pointing at stuff and saying things like "I see sailboat Daddy!" and "giant red bridge Daddy!" ( That's what he calls the Golden Gate Bridge - we had seen it up close on Monday ). Now that he's finally started to talk a bit, I just love to hear his cute little voice. I need to cherish every little moment like that. He's still my baby boy, but I know he won't be a baby forever.
So, the boat trip went rather well, but things got a little bit tougher once we got on the island. It soon became clear that our options were going to be a bit limited by the boys. I was really interested in a guided tour about Alcatraz escapes ( given by a former FBI agent who once swam from Alcatraz to San Francisco ), but we had to quit that tour after about 5 minutes because Peter needed to go potty just as the tour group was leaving to head to another location. We finally decided to make our way up to the prison building to do the main tour. The boys were real troopers on that walk. We were told it was a 130 foot climb from the dock to the main prison building, but the boys made it without a problem ( I was VERY thankful I didn't have to carry Peter up the hill ). The tour was a self-guided one. You were given headphones and an audio device when you got in ( a very low-tech iPod-type thingy ). There were about 20 chapters on the audio thingy. The audio device would tell you where to go and tell a story about each each location. You could start and stop the audio recording whenever you wanted, which meant you could do the tour at your own pace. This all seemed kinda promising, because it meant we could take a break from the tour whenever the boys acted up. Unfortunately the boys acted up quite a bit. At times, it seemed like they were re-enacting a prison riot. It's not really a bad thing for boys to fight and wrestle a bit ( As Ruth's Dad told us "Don't worry about the boys fighting. You should only worry if they don't fight each other. If two brothers close in age don't fight each other, then something's wrong.". In other words, "Boys will be boys", and they were certainly being boys that day. ), but it made it tough to concentrate on the tour when the boys were constantly wrestling at my feet, chasing each other, and pulling each other down. They really weren't fighting in a malicious way. I think they were just bored by the whole tour and were looking for something more fun to do. They had spent much of the past week watching a DVD called "Scooby Doo and the Goblin King". We had brought a portable DVD player and about 20 DVDs on the trip ( to keep the boys entertained on the plane and in the evenings ), but it seemed like they only wanted to watch the Goblin King. There's a comical scene in the Goblin King where two guard fight each other, and it seemed like the boys were trying to re-enact that scene. So it was more of a giggling fight than a screaming fight, but it was still rather distracting, and I was still worried that they were going to hurt themselves ( considering that there were steel bars all over the place ). Ruth was also still feeling a bit sea-sick, so after a while she needed to sit down, and I was doing the tour all on my own with the two boys. After doing the tour with the boys for about 20 minutes I realized that I was never going to be able to take many pictures ( because I had to keep my eyes on the boys ). I knew that Ruth would be disappointed if we didn't get a a lot of good pictures, so I dropped he boys off with Ruth, and started to do the tour on my own. After a few minutes a I started to worry that Ruth might be having a hard time with the boys ( and her sea-sickness ), so I made my way quickly around the whole prison and took every picture I could. By that time I was only halfway through the audio tour, but I decided to give up and head back to Ruth and the boys. When I got back to where I had left them, I found they were no longer there. Michael had apparently needed to go potty really bad, so Ruth had left the tour location completely to go to the bathroom just outside the prison building. Eventually, I got in touch with Ruth by phone and we met in the prison gift shop.
And that was about it for our Alcatraz tour. We headed back down to get the boat back to San Fran. By the time we got on the boat it was 2:30, but it really didn't seem like we had done much. Don't get me wrong - we had a lot of fun and saw a lot of cool stuff, but we didn't do quite as much as we thought we would do. Still, all in all, it was a good time.
Well, I see it's bedtime for me again, so I'll have to continue this story later. Stay tuned for the next episode, which I'll probably call "Even More About Friday".
Rich
Monday, August 31, 2009
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Back Home
I got back home last night at about 11 PM. It's now about 24 hours later and I'll be waking up in 7 hours to go to work. I can't face the thought of work quite yet, so I'm going to try to escape with a quick blog entry ( please excuse any typos - I really need to get to sleep soon ).
They'll be plenty of time later to tell you all about San Fran and Yosemite ( and plenty of time for pictures/videos ), but for now I'd like to say a few quick things about what happened on Friday, because it's kinda a natural extension to my recent "Parenthood" blog post. Parenthood is wonderful and rewarding, but it also can be quite exhausting at times, and Friday was a good example. The plan on Friday was to visit Alcatraz Island and do the prison tour, and then meet Ruth's family ( Her Dad, who came with us on the trip; Ruth's Uncle Joey ( her Dad's brother - we stayed at his house in the Bay area ); Ruth's cousin Jeffrey ( Joey's son ) and his girlfriend, Ruth's Aunt Amy ( her Dad's sister - also lives in the Bay Area ); Ruth's sister Debby and her husband Orion - they moved to the Bay Area ( Berkeley ) in March ) for dinner at this small restaurant in Chinatown ).
Things started well. We got out of the house bright and early and got parking right across the street from Pier 33 ( where the Alcatraz boat leaves from ) by 10 AM. We picked up our tickets ( we had reserved the 12:00 boat online - you had to reserve in advance ) and were told that we should be ready to board the boat at 11:40.
We then decided to head over to Pier 39. Pier 39 has a bunch of restaurants and shops. We had an early lunch/brunch there ( clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl - yummy yummy! ), but we then made a strategic mistake. We decided to head to the end of the pier to give the boys a look at the sea lions ( they sun themselves at the end of the pier ). Unfortunately, there were also a bunch of kiddie rides at the end of the Pier. Peter didn't want to leave the ride, but by the time it got to be 11:20 or so, I decided we needed to head back. Somehow, I convinced Peter to let me pick him up without much protest, and we started to walk back to the land side of the pier, so we could head back to Pier 33. I asked Ruth to walk ahead with Michael, so Michael could set a good example for Peter. Peter let me carry him for about 100 feet, but once he started to realized that we were leaving the rides he started to throw a fit. He threw such a fit that I had to call Ruth on the phone ( she was about 50 feet ahead of me - I couldn't yell because allergies had wrecked my throat by then - more on that later ) and ask her to come back and walk next to me, because I was seriously concerned that people were going to think I was kidnapping Peter.
Well anyway, the next 15 minutes were quite an ordeal. Peter weighs about 40 pounds. Carrying 40 pounds for about 6 blocks isn't real a big deal, but it is when those 40 pounds are fighting you the entire way. Not only I did have to lift him, but I had to pull him in towards me the whole way because he was using his hands and feet to try to push himself away from me the whole time ( despite the fact that if he had pushed himself out of my grasp he would have fallen back-first towards the concrete floor below ). Eventually Peter decided that pushing against my chest wasn't effective enough and started to push with his hands against my neck. This obviously made things more difficult as I was now effectively being chocked as I tried to walk and keep him from slipping to the concrete.
Anyway, but the time we made it to the line for the Alcatraz boat, my biceps were burning more than they ever had in my life, and my trachea wasn't feeling all too great. Yes, parenthood is tough - and it was still only 11:40.
It's now 12:02 AM on Monday morning, so I'm going to have to cut this blog short and finish this story later. I would have written more but Peter started acting up about 40 minutes ago ( he's still on West Coast time). He kept bugging Michael ( who was trying to sleep ), so I had to go and defuse the situation before it became a huge brawl. Yes, parenthood is tough.
See ya folks,
Rich
They'll be plenty of time later to tell you all about San Fran and Yosemite ( and plenty of time for pictures/videos ), but for now I'd like to say a few quick things about what happened on Friday, because it's kinda a natural extension to my recent "Parenthood" blog post. Parenthood is wonderful and rewarding, but it also can be quite exhausting at times, and Friday was a good example. The plan on Friday was to visit Alcatraz Island and do the prison tour, and then meet Ruth's family ( Her Dad, who came with us on the trip; Ruth's Uncle Joey ( her Dad's brother - we stayed at his house in the Bay area ); Ruth's cousin Jeffrey ( Joey's son ) and his girlfriend, Ruth's Aunt Amy ( her Dad's sister - also lives in the Bay Area ); Ruth's sister Debby and her husband Orion - they moved to the Bay Area ( Berkeley ) in March ) for dinner at this small restaurant in Chinatown ).
Things started well. We got out of the house bright and early and got parking right across the street from Pier 33 ( where the Alcatraz boat leaves from ) by 10 AM. We picked up our tickets ( we had reserved the 12:00 boat online - you had to reserve in advance ) and were told that we should be ready to board the boat at 11:40.
We then decided to head over to Pier 39. Pier 39 has a bunch of restaurants and shops. We had an early lunch/brunch there ( clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl - yummy yummy! ), but we then made a strategic mistake. We decided to head to the end of the pier to give the boys a look at the sea lions ( they sun themselves at the end of the pier ). Unfortunately, there were also a bunch of kiddie rides at the end of the Pier. Peter didn't want to leave the ride, but by the time it got to be 11:20 or so, I decided we needed to head back. Somehow, I convinced Peter to let me pick him up without much protest, and we started to walk back to the land side of the pier, so we could head back to Pier 33. I asked Ruth to walk ahead with Michael, so Michael could set a good example for Peter. Peter let me carry him for about 100 feet, but once he started to realized that we were leaving the rides he started to throw a fit. He threw such a fit that I had to call Ruth on the phone ( she was about 50 feet ahead of me - I couldn't yell because allergies had wrecked my throat by then - more on that later ) and ask her to come back and walk next to me, because I was seriously concerned that people were going to think I was kidnapping Peter.
Well anyway, the next 15 minutes were quite an ordeal. Peter weighs about 40 pounds. Carrying 40 pounds for about 6 blocks isn't real a big deal, but it is when those 40 pounds are fighting you the entire way. Not only I did have to lift him, but I had to pull him in towards me the whole way because he was using his hands and feet to try to push himself away from me the whole time ( despite the fact that if he had pushed himself out of my grasp he would have fallen back-first towards the concrete floor below ). Eventually Peter decided that pushing against my chest wasn't effective enough and started to push with his hands against my neck. This obviously made things more difficult as I was now effectively being chocked as I tried to walk and keep him from slipping to the concrete.
Anyway, but the time we made it to the line for the Alcatraz boat, my biceps were burning more than they ever had in my life, and my trachea wasn't feeling all too great. Yes, parenthood is tough - and it was still only 11:40.
It's now 12:02 AM on Monday morning, so I'm going to have to cut this blog short and finish this story later. I would have written more but Peter started acting up about 40 minutes ago ( he's still on West Coast time). He kept bugging Michael ( who was trying to sleep ), so I had to go and defuse the situation before it became a huge brawl. Yes, parenthood is tough.
See ya folks,
Rich
Friday, August 21, 2009
California here I come
Well, as I said in my last post, there aint gonna be much blogin' this month, but I figured I might as well shoot off a really quick post just to let you know I'm alive and well.
I'll heading to California with my family tomorrow morning. We spent all night packing, and I'll be heading off to bed in a few minutes. We have an 11:30 flight, but I want to make sure we get on the road by 8 AM. Traveling isn't easy with two little kids. We've got to lug two big car seats with us, and just getting everything from the long-term parking to the airport terminal can be quite an ordeal. However, I'm really looking forward to the trip. We'll be staying in the San Fran area, and we'll also be spending a few days in Yosemite National Park. There's gonna be a lot of fun stuff to do and a lot of great things to see. Hopefully, we'll get some nice pictures out of this too.
Rich
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Timesinks
I'm probably not going to do a lot of blogging or YT-ing the rest of this month. I've got a lot to do ( taking a trip to California at the end of the month ), and there's a lot of random stuff that is taking up a bunch of my time. I started to work on my 30 questions blog response, but as I was doing some research for the "favorite video game" question, I stumbled across this major timesink. The link in the last sentence may not mean much to most of the people reading this, but if you played Atari 2600 games back in the 70's and 80's, DO NOT CLICK ON THE LINK unless you have several hours to spare RIGHT NOW.
Some of the other things that are taking up my time include ...
My new laptop: The laptop came with 60-days of Norton anti-virus. The Norton product installed was really just a bare-bones product, so rather than wait 60 days, I decided to download and install the top-of-the-line Norton product. So I bought the product ( with a two-year subscription ), downloaded it, and started to install it. During installation, the Norton installation process informed me that it detected another Norton product on the computer. It told me it removed the product, and said I had to restart the computer to continue the installation. So, I restarted the computer, and the installation continued. A few seconds later the Norton installation process informed me that it had detected a Norton product on the computer ( uh oh - you see where this is going, don't you? ). It told me that it had deleted the other Norton product, and instructed me to restart the computer to continue the installation. Uh oh! Yes, I was stuck in a very unhappy loop. I was up to 3 AM trying to figure out a way around this, but eventually I gave up. Thankfully, I had made backup images of the initial laptop setup before I did anything else with the laptop, so the next morning, I simply restored that laptop to the original factory settings. I can still access and re-download the Norton product via their website, and for the next 60 days, the laptop will be protected by the original Norton product. So, basically, I've just kicked the problem 60 days down the road. I'm going to wait for the 60-day trial to end, and then I'm going to try downloading and installing the new Norton product again. I sure hope this works the next time I try it.
Fruit flies: For the last few weeks I've been battling an infestation of fruit flies in my house. I don't want to use anything like a spray with little kids around the house, so let's just say I've been killing these flies the old fashioned-way ( If you consider spending 30 minutes each night sucking them up with a vacuum old-fashioned - It's really the only way to get them without using sprays, ugly flypaper, or making a mess on the walls and windows . ). I really have no idea where the flies are coming from. I was killing about 100 a night for a while, and it seemed like there would be at least 100 more each day. I've been trying as hard as I can to terminate these little suckers faster than they can reproduce. I think I'm finally starting to win the battle, because the flies have really started to thin out over the last few days.
I enjoyed the following video so much, that it became a bit of a timesink yesterday ( Sorry, embedding is disabled for this video ). You really need to be a Beatles fan to appreciate this video, but if you are a Beatles fan, I'm sure you'll be very impressed by it.
Oh, even though it was a bit of a timesink, I think the Beatles parody video inspired me to get back in the business of making parody songs on YT. Nobody really took me up on my "Love is a Battlefield" offer, but I just thought of a parody I could do completely by myself. It's going to be a while before I find the time to make this video, but because you're all such loyal readers, I'll give you a little inside information about the video I'm about to make.
Earlier today, I read an article on fivethirtyeight.com which mentioned Michelle Malkin.
For some reason, this inspired me to start writing a Michelle Malkin song parody based on the Beatles song "Michelle".
The parody will be a ( hopefully ) humorous take on my conflicted feelings about Michelle Malkin. Michelle Malkin is a conservative super-right-wing politic pundit. I absolutely detest her political views ( To give you an idea of where she is coming from, she wrote a book called "In Defense of Interment" in which see defended the forced interment of Japanese Americans during World War II ). However, I also think she's REALLY REALLY HOT. Don't get me wrong - even if I was single I would never want to date somebody like her in a million years, but I still can't help but be a little bit turned on every time I see her on TV. It actually makes me feel a little bit guilty, considering how much I hate everything she stands for.
It made me feel especially guilty when I found I was a little turned-on by the video below:
Rich
Some of the other things that are taking up my time include ...
My new laptop: The laptop came with 60-days of Norton anti-virus. The Norton product installed was really just a bare-bones product, so rather than wait 60 days, I decided to download and install the top-of-the-line Norton product. So I bought the product ( with a two-year subscription ), downloaded it, and started to install it. During installation, the Norton installation process informed me that it detected another Norton product on the computer. It told me it removed the product, and said I had to restart the computer to continue the installation. So, I restarted the computer, and the installation continued. A few seconds later the Norton installation process informed me that it had detected a Norton product on the computer ( uh oh - you see where this is going, don't you? ). It told me that it had deleted the other Norton product, and instructed me to restart the computer to continue the installation. Uh oh! Yes, I was stuck in a very unhappy loop. I was up to 3 AM trying to figure out a way around this, but eventually I gave up. Thankfully, I had made backup images of the initial laptop setup before I did anything else with the laptop, so the next morning, I simply restored that laptop to the original factory settings. I can still access and re-download the Norton product via their website, and for the next 60 days, the laptop will be protected by the original Norton product. So, basically, I've just kicked the problem 60 days down the road. I'm going to wait for the 60-day trial to end, and then I'm going to try downloading and installing the new Norton product again. I sure hope this works the next time I try it.
Fruit flies: For the last few weeks I've been battling an infestation of fruit flies in my house. I don't want to use anything like a spray with little kids around the house, so let's just say I've been killing these flies the old fashioned-way ( If you consider spending 30 minutes each night sucking them up with a vacuum old-fashioned - It's really the only way to get them without using sprays, ugly flypaper, or making a mess on the walls and windows . ). I really have no idea where the flies are coming from. I was killing about 100 a night for a while, and it seemed like there would be at least 100 more each day. I've been trying as hard as I can to terminate these little suckers faster than they can reproduce. I think I'm finally starting to win the battle, because the flies have really started to thin out over the last few days.
I enjoyed the following video so much, that it became a bit of a timesink yesterday ( Sorry, embedding is disabled for this video ). You really need to be a Beatles fan to appreciate this video, but if you are a Beatles fan, I'm sure you'll be very impressed by it.
Oh, even though it was a bit of a timesink, I think the Beatles parody video inspired me to get back in the business of making parody songs on YT. Nobody really took me up on my "Love is a Battlefield" offer, but I just thought of a parody I could do completely by myself. It's going to be a while before I find the time to make this video, but because you're all such loyal readers, I'll give you a little inside information about the video I'm about to make.
Earlier today, I read an article on fivethirtyeight.com which mentioned Michelle Malkin.
For some reason, this inspired me to start writing a Michelle Malkin song parody based on the Beatles song "Michelle".
The parody will be a ( hopefully ) humorous take on my conflicted feelings about Michelle Malkin. Michelle Malkin is a conservative super-right-wing politic pundit. I absolutely detest her political views ( To give you an idea of where she is coming from, she wrote a book called "In Defense of Interment" in which see defended the forced interment of Japanese Americans during World War II ). However, I also think she's REALLY REALLY HOT. Don't get me wrong - even if I was single I would never want to date somebody like her in a million years, but I still can't help but be a little bit turned on every time I see her on TV. It actually makes me feel a little bit guilty, considering how much I hate everything she stands for.
It made me feel especially guilty when I found I was a little turned-on by the video below:
Rich
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Dave Winfield is 57
Dave Winfield is 57. He was quoted in a news article today, and he was referred to as "Dave Winfield, 57". This makes me feel rather old. It always makes you feel old when you realize that one of the sports stars you watched as kid is almost a senior citizen (Note to the non-Americans out there: Dave Winfield was a Hall-of-Fame baseball player who played from 1973 to 1995. He played for the New York Yankees from 1981 to 1990. I'm from New York, and I remember that it was huge news when he was signed by the Yankees, because his Yankees contract made him the highest paid baseball player of all time. The size of his contract and the Yankees' failure to win a World Series during his years with the team led to a lot of tension between Winfield and the Yankees' owner ( more on that at the end of this blog post ). While he was never one of my favorite players ( He was a New York Yankee after all, and everyone who knows me IRL can tell you that if you cut me open, I'll bleed the ORANGE and BLUE of the NEW YORK METS ), but I always admired his talent ). I couldn't believe that this incredibly graceful athlete I used to watch was now practically an old man ( I just noticed that he'll turn 58 in less than 2 months ).
As I pondered Winfield and his age, I thought back to some of the great catches he made in the Yankees Stadium outfield. This somehow reminded me of another great catch made at Yankees Stadium - a catch made by a player named Ken Griffey. Thinking about Ken Griffey made me feel even older.
Ken Griffey was another ballplayer whose career started in 1973. I'm too young remember his entire career ( I was born in January of 1970 ), but I remember Griffey playing in the 1976 World Series ( at Yankees Stadium ) when he was an All-Star outfielder for the world champion Cincinnati Reds.
However, this memory ( and the fact that Ken Griffey is already 59 ) isn't what is making me feel old. What's making me feel old is that Ken Griffey Jr. is now nearing the end of his baseball career.
Ken Griffey Jr.'s career started in 1989 when was a 19-year-old rookie ( He was actually teammates with his dad for one year ). Griffey's less than 2-months older than me ( he was born in November of 1969 ), so watching him age over the years has kinda been like watching myself age. It's hard to believe that such a young, skinny, and graceful ballplayer who once looked like this ...
... is now a washed-up middle-aged player with a big gut who looks like this ...
It's hard to believe that 20 years of his ( and my ) life has passed that quickly.
Seeing how Griffey has aged makes me think about how I have aged over the years. If I compare how I look now to photos from 20 years ago, it certainly doesn't seem like I've aged *that* much. Sure, I've got a wrinkle or two around my eyes, but I think I basically look the same ( Yes, I keep telling myself that - please don't correct me if I'm wrong. :p ). I also don't think I've lost too much athletically. I've lost a *little* of bit of ability when it comes to stuff that requires flexibility and quick bursts of power ( like sprinting, jumping, or lifting weights ), but I certainly have *far* better endurance than I did when I was 20 ( I didn't start a running regimen until I was 31 ). Of course, it's a lot easier for me to maintain the athletic ability of my 20's than somebody like Griffey. Griffey was a world-class athlete ( When he was in his prime, many considered Griffey to be the best baseball player in the world ), while I'm just a regular guy. Griffey had a lot more athletic ability to lose than me ( I guess that's one of the advantages of not being a world-class athlete. If you are not a world-class athlete and you work hard enough, you could theoretically be in the best shape of your life at 50. If you're the best athlete in the world at 25, there's no way you could be in even better shape at the age of 50. ).
In any case, I guess there's no way to stave off Father Time forever, so rather than dwell on that, let me end this post on a lighter note.
Earlier in this post, I mentioned the tension between Dave Winfield and the Yankees' owner ( Geroge Steinbrenner ). The tension stemmed from Steinbrenner's comments after the 1981 World Series ( baseball's championship series ). The Yankees lost that Series in large part because Winfield only got 1 hit in 22 tries in the Series ( Note to non-baseball fans: That is indeed a REALLY REALLY bad performance ). After the Series, Steinbrenner derisively referred to Winfield as "Mr. May". Why was this considered to be a big insult? Well, let me explain for all the non-baseball fans out there.
The baseball regular season runs from April to September. In October, baseball determines its champion through a series of playoff games which culminate in the 2 best teams playing for the championship in the World Series. The Yankees had won the World Series in 1977 and 1978 in large part because of the great performances of a player named Reggie Jackson. Reggie set a record for most home runs in one World Series in 1977, and he also led his former team ( the Oakland A's ) to three straight World Series Championships from 1972 to 1974. Thanks to his consistently great performances in the World Series, Reggie earned the nickname "Mr. October". When, Steinbrenner called Winfield "Mr. May", he was essentially telling him "You're no Reggie Jackson".
While most of the non-Americans reading this have never seen Reggie Jackson play baseball ( His last season was 1987, so most of you would have been too young ( or too unborn ) to have seen him play anyway ), you've all probably seen him in a movie. If you haven't seen him in the movie I'm thinking about, I strongly suggest that you go rent this movie right NAO! The movie I'm talking about is "The Naked Gun", which IMHO is one of the two or three funniest movies of all-time. Reggie plays the baseball player who keeps saying "I must kill the Queen". You can see Reggie's performance starting at the 1:54 point of the clip below:
I'll leave you with my favorite quote from "The Naked Gun".
"Jane, since I've met you, I've noticed things that I never knew were there before...
... birds singing,
...dew glistening on a newly formed leaf,
... stoplights."
Rich
As I pondered Winfield and his age, I thought back to some of the great catches he made in the Yankees Stadium outfield. This somehow reminded me of another great catch made at Yankees Stadium - a catch made by a player named Ken Griffey. Thinking about Ken Griffey made me feel even older.
Ken Griffey was another ballplayer whose career started in 1973. I'm too young remember his entire career ( I was born in January of 1970 ), but I remember Griffey playing in the 1976 World Series ( at Yankees Stadium ) when he was an All-Star outfielder for the world champion Cincinnati Reds.
However, this memory ( and the fact that Ken Griffey is already 59 ) isn't what is making me feel old. What's making me feel old is that Ken Griffey Jr. is now nearing the end of his baseball career.
Ken Griffey Jr.'s career started in 1989 when was a 19-year-old rookie ( He was actually teammates with his dad for one year ). Griffey's less than 2-months older than me ( he was born in November of 1969 ), so watching him age over the years has kinda been like watching myself age. It's hard to believe that such a young, skinny, and graceful ballplayer who once looked like this ...
... is now a washed-up middle-aged player with a big gut who looks like this ...
It's hard to believe that 20 years of his ( and my ) life has passed that quickly.
Seeing how Griffey has aged makes me think about how I have aged over the years. If I compare how I look now to photos from 20 years ago, it certainly doesn't seem like I've aged *that* much. Sure, I've got a wrinkle or two around my eyes, but I think I basically look the same ( Yes, I keep telling myself that - please don't correct me if I'm wrong. :p ). I also don't think I've lost too much athletically. I've lost a *little* of bit of ability when it comes to stuff that requires flexibility and quick bursts of power ( like sprinting, jumping, or lifting weights ), but I certainly have *far* better endurance than I did when I was 20 ( I didn't start a running regimen until I was 31 ). Of course, it's a lot easier for me to maintain the athletic ability of my 20's than somebody like Griffey. Griffey was a world-class athlete ( When he was in his prime, many considered Griffey to be the best baseball player in the world ), while I'm just a regular guy. Griffey had a lot more athletic ability to lose than me ( I guess that's one of the advantages of not being a world-class athlete. If you are not a world-class athlete and you work hard enough, you could theoretically be in the best shape of your life at 50. If you're the best athlete in the world at 25, there's no way you could be in even better shape at the age of 50. ).
In any case, I guess there's no way to stave off Father Time forever, so rather than dwell on that, let me end this post on a lighter note.
Earlier in this post, I mentioned the tension between Dave Winfield and the Yankees' owner ( Geroge Steinbrenner ). The tension stemmed from Steinbrenner's comments after the 1981 World Series ( baseball's championship series ). The Yankees lost that Series in large part because Winfield only got 1 hit in 22 tries in the Series ( Note to non-baseball fans: That is indeed a REALLY REALLY bad performance ). After the Series, Steinbrenner derisively referred to Winfield as "Mr. May". Why was this considered to be a big insult? Well, let me explain for all the non-baseball fans out there.
The baseball regular season runs from April to September. In October, baseball determines its champion through a series of playoff games which culminate in the 2 best teams playing for the championship in the World Series. The Yankees had won the World Series in 1977 and 1978 in large part because of the great performances of a player named Reggie Jackson. Reggie set a record for most home runs in one World Series in 1977, and he also led his former team ( the Oakland A's ) to three straight World Series Championships from 1972 to 1974. Thanks to his consistently great performances in the World Series, Reggie earned the nickname "Mr. October". When, Steinbrenner called Winfield "Mr. May", he was essentially telling him "You're no Reggie Jackson".
While most of the non-Americans reading this have never seen Reggie Jackson play baseball ( His last season was 1987, so most of you would have been too young ( or too unborn ) to have seen him play anyway ), you've all probably seen him in a movie. If you haven't seen him in the movie I'm thinking about, I strongly suggest that you go rent this movie right NAO! The movie I'm talking about is "The Naked Gun", which IMHO is one of the two or three funniest movies of all-time. Reggie plays the baseball player who keeps saying "I must kill the Queen". You can see Reggie's performance starting at the 1:54 point of the clip below:
I'll leave you with my favorite quote from "The Naked Gun".
"Jane, since I've met you, I've noticed things that I never knew were there before...
... birds singing,
...dew glistening on a newly formed leaf,
... stoplights."
Rich
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
So Heartwarming
I usually don't cover real world news in the blog, but I saw something today that I just had to share.
I'm sure most of you have heard the Laura Ling / Euna Lee story by now. If you haven't heard the story ( perhaps this wasn't covered much outside of the USA? ), you can Google their names for details, but the gist of the story is this: Laura and Euna are American journalist who have basically been held hostage by North Korea for the last 5 months. They were released yesterday thanks to the intervention of Bill Clinton.
When the story first broke 5 months ago, the media did a few interviews Laura and Euna's families. I was particularly touched to learn about Euna's pre-school aged daughter. As a parent of two young children, I kept thinking about how horrible it would be to be separated from my boys. I got misty-eyed when I heard Euna's husband say that their daughter kept asking when Mommy was going to come home.
So, when I heard they were being released, all I could think about is how wonderful if would be when Euna was reunited with her daughter again. Sometime this morning, Laura and Euna arrived back in the USA. I read the story at work, and got kinda choked-up when I saw the photo below.
Take a look at Euna's face in this photo. Really - click on the photo to enlarge it and take a look at her face. This is one of the most heartwarming images I have ever seen. I think I would've made the exact same kind of face if I had been reunited with my kids after 5 months. I feel so happy for Euna, and so happy that her little daughter gets to be with Mommy again.
I'm getting a warm feeling in my heart just from writing this blog post. I'll leave you with a couple of other photos I also found heartwarming ...
I'm sure most of you have heard the Laura Ling / Euna Lee story by now. If you haven't heard the story ( perhaps this wasn't covered much outside of the USA? ), you can Google their names for details, but the gist of the story is this: Laura and Euna are American journalist who have basically been held hostage by North Korea for the last 5 months. They were released yesterday thanks to the intervention of Bill Clinton.
When the story first broke 5 months ago, the media did a few interviews Laura and Euna's families. I was particularly touched to learn about Euna's pre-school aged daughter. As a parent of two young children, I kept thinking about how horrible it would be to be separated from my boys. I got misty-eyed when I heard Euna's husband say that their daughter kept asking when Mommy was going to come home.
So, when I heard they were being released, all I could think about is how wonderful if would be when Euna was reunited with her daughter again. Sometime this morning, Laura and Euna arrived back in the USA. I read the story at work, and got kinda choked-up when I saw the photo below.
Take a look at Euna's face in this photo. Really - click on the photo to enlarge it and take a look at her face. This is one of the most heartwarming images I have ever seen. I think I would've made the exact same kind of face if I had been reunited with my kids after 5 months. I feel so happy for Euna, and so happy that her little daughter gets to be with Mommy again.
I'm getting a warm feeling in my heart just from writing this blog post. I'll leave you with a couple of other photos I also found heartwarming ...
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