Friday, June 16, 2006

And Another Thing

This definitely proves the power of a buck:

Have you seen all these posters around for the new Michael Bolton album? I was in Boston last weekend and saw them in storefront windows everywhere. Not music stores, regular stores. There was some place called "Quality Meats" or something with it in there.

Now I'm seeing them in New York. People are willingly showcasing Michael Bolton in their window. Is there any other reason besides the promise of cash that anyone would do this?

"Hello, how can I help you?"

"Oh, hi, I work for Michael Bolton's record label. I was wondering if I could put this huge picture of his face in your front window."

"No chance in hell."

"We'll give you money."

"Absolutely, then."

Grow a spine, shopowners of America!

Note: If anyone is about to comment to me that Michael Bolton is good, or that "Well, he is doing Sinatra songs...," well, you're welcome to do so, but immediately following that, you might as well turn off your computer, go to the window, and jump out, as your life is, for all intents and purposes, over already.

First Dude That Comes To Mind For Each Uni Number

1 McNamara, 2 Remy, 3 Rick Miller, 4 Doerr, 5 Nomar, 6 Buckner, 7 Spike Owen (also wore 5), 8 Yaz, 9 Ted, 10, Gedman of course, 11 Naehring, 12 Lyons (also wore 7), 13 Billy Jo Robidoux (Valentin came into my head quickly after the "Billy" in BJR), 14 Rice of course. By the way, the other day, saw a minute or so of Fever Pitch on HBO, noticed in the 1980 shot that they had a white guy wearing 14! TJ!, 15 Lamp, 16 also Buckner, 17 Barrett, 18 Hoffman, 19 Sellers, 20 D-Lew, 21 Clemens, 22 pass, 23 Bruno!, 24 Evans (sorry Manny, you popped in a second too late). 25 Larry Parrish, 26 Boggs unfortunately, 27 pass, 28 Doug, 29 Foulke, 30 Offerman (barforama), 31 pass, 32 Lowe, 33 pass, 34 pass, 35 nondescript manager, 36 nondespript coach (Rac Slider-ish?), 37 Lee (Piersall a second late), 38 WSBK, 39 Gator, 40, well, I'll stop there for now.

Try it yourself. But wait like two weeks so it's not affected by my answers. Rules: you have one second for each number. If no one comes into head after one second, you must pass.

Gale' Warning

Tonight starts the rematch of the would've-been 1948 World Series. The Braves, like their former city-mates, have lost quatro in a row. We should sweep them, if only because baseball always brings the unexpected, and the Red Sox look like the worst one-game-back team in baseball right now. But now that I'm expecting the sweep, that makes getting swept the unexpected. So, I'm actually expecting to get swept. (Now we'll sweep!) Did I say that out loud? Oh, no, there were parentheses, I'm safe. The point is, our hitting should be enough to save us even when our pitching is this bad. So, once they start doing that, which they will, and with the added bonus of some better pitching (Theo: That's your cue, buddy!) coming soon, I think, as I usually do, that we'll be fine.

Thursday, June 15, 2006

Damn These Things!

McDonough was right. The Metrodome is a garbage dump.

Yanks Lose

The Yanks just lost to the Native Americans, so we're a half game back again. Also, we traded David Riske, lowering the "risk"-related joke quotient to 0.

Whoa, guy, you must be saying, did you just capitalize "Yankees"? Yes. Those lower case days are over as of five minutes ago.

I always did it because I never felt they deserved capitalization. And I still don't. However, for the sole purpose of further distancing myself from the dumber side of Dunbar District, I'm ending the tradition now.

The only reason I had before to stop was to maybe make this operation a little more professional-like. But I thought, What am I, a newspaper reporter? No. I'm some dude. If I want to spell Yankees with a lower case "y," I will. If it's the difference between the Globe asking me to do a column with me saying no to them and them not asking me, so be it.

Now, though, after so much talk of Yankee fans consistently screwing up "your" and "you're," and things like that, I'm finally taking that step, just in case they want to try to use it against me. Remember, never give them an inch, because they'll take 26 bought-off soul-less miles.

But that brings up another point. It's really "Yankees fans," whereas I always say the dirtier sounding "Yankee fans." I guess I have to change in that department, too.

Don't worry, the slander of the classy yankee, I mean, Yankee, I mean, Yankees name will continue, strong as ever. But I'll do it through the meanings of my words, not their spellings.

Note: I, of course, reserve the right to spell or use any word however I want without warning, and to change my mind about any of this at at any time. Terrible job? Ehhhh, NO, Peg.

This Day In Jere History

2005--Jere meets Witch City Sox Girl in person for the first time, at Boston's historic Fenway Park.

2004--Jere writes an optimistic post about the Red Sox that turns out to be prophetic, including such lines as "I'm gonna root my ass off for my team and this year it's gonna be fun right up until the end." and "'s in our hands. If we want to beat [the yanks], we can do it."

1985--Jere most likely goes to Pat's house and plays outside. Probably Wiffle Ball. Or Frisbee. Hey, kinda like his life now.

1981--Jere puts the finishing touches on a successful year in Mrs. Barkal's kidergarten class.

1975--Jere's hearing fully develops within the womb. As he reacts to sounds, his pulse increases. He begins to move in rhythm to music.

Shakespeare Sans Sunay

















photo courtesy

Wednesday, June 14, 2006


Chan news: He rarely updates his blog, but I just noticed another gem over there. Also, Chan told me this story the other day:

He was over at the park by the East River, which is actually a tidal arm, not a river, and someone had gone over the railing with their bike. Not into the river (actually tidal arm), but just down below to an area between the esplanade and the river, which, shouldn't be called a river (what with it being a tidal arm and all). So there were a bunch of cops and ambulances around, as rescue workers tried to pull the man up, stuck between a rock (the esplanade) and a hard place (say it with me: the tidal arm). As passersby did what they're known for, they'd stop and ask Chan what was going on down there, curious about all the rescue workers, as surely someone was in trouble. Chan's answer to them: "I dropped my keys down there..."

He told me that story while I got an ice cream cone at the Dunkin Donuts/Baskin & Robbins. Single scoop, sugar cone, with sprinkles. Guess how much it cost. Seriously.

Van B Boi

Something seems wrong about the following sentence:

"Thank god Jermaine Van Buren is back."

He's ridin' that Pawtucket ex-pres. The 8 train.

(Ex-pres line somewhat stolen from MattySox.)

Oh, by the way, did I fucking dream this: A Chips Ahoy commercial with a bunch of "punk" cookies chanting "Chips Ahoy! Oi! Oi!"? 2006: The Year Oi Broke? At the marketing division of RJR Nabisco? What's going on here?

For non-music fans, or Matchbox 20 types: click here.

Tuesday, June 13, 2006


Now maybe we get rid of shithead Tavarez. He can have temper tantrums, make homophobic statements, and pitch shittily on some other team. Hopefully the yanks. Does great on the first hitter, then hits the second, and that was it as far as I was concerned.

The 3-0 to Trot, why did he have a green light? He's the go-ahead run. Take a walk!

This loss combined with Mariano's one-and-a-half-times too wide home plate, and we're tied.

Stupid Tavarez.

Stupid, stupid tavarez.

I'm gonna tell my little funny story, but don't expect too much enthusiasm: So I see these guys all the time on the sidewalk, wearing blue jumpsuits and pushing garbage pails around. Their outfits say "Ready, Willing, and Able." I didn't know what they were supposed to be doing at first, but I think I've figured it out now:

Ready to stand around and gawk at women walking by.

Willing to rotate all the way around to stare at their passing butts until they're a block away, emabarrassing themselves and everyone around and turning our society back to when we were apes.

Able to do this for every female that walks by.

Terrible job, Bloomberg. Get your head in the game.

Monday, June 12, 2006

Pictures And Words And Stuff

Saturday, June 10th, 2 AC.* We got to the park around noon, wondering why the rain that was supposed to stop hadn't stopped. "Any minute," we thought.
Were we right? Eh, NO, Peg. Our seats were down in the field boxes, third base side. See that aisle in the above photo? On that aisle, nine rows from the field. Once a year I buy the best seats possible. I was kind of pissed that it turned out to be for a game in which we could've gone and sat there anyway, because of all the no-shows. (click all these to embiggen)

For an hour or so, we just chilled out under the overhang, waiting. The scoreboard said they would reassess the rain situation at 1:30. Other than that, we never got any updates.

I was effing around with pole/Pru picture ideas. I didn't get a triple double. I got this. Another idea would be to have the Pru hiding behind the pole, much like how Wes Anderson filmed a scene in Royal Tenenbaums with the Statue of Liberty in the background, only to have a character block it out on purpose. (Gene Hackman was in that scene, meaning I've mentioned him in two consecutive posts.)

I took this same shot on June 9th, 2004, on the day of Nomar's return from injury, in the pre-digital camera days. I've always wanted to re-take it, complete with rain and umbrellas. I had no idea one of the people glanced over at me--my head, actually, peeking out of the tunnel--until I saw the photo later. I think I like the old shot better. More cups and puddles on the ground. This one's cool, too, though.

Then we finally went underneath and watched the yanks-A's game on a huge TV. (It was also playing on the scoreboard in center.) We watched the last few exciting innings, including Jeter making the final out. Everyone went nuts. Then we made a call saying we wouldn't be able to make the 6:00 party we'd planned on attending, since it was five and the tarp was still on. My prediction turned out to be true: They'd call off game two and keep us here until they were ready to play.

We finally went down to the seats, a little before the tarp finally came off.

I love this shot of the grounds crew, waiting for the call to charge.

Shoot the curl-style.

A fifteen-foot breaker!

You can tell by the fact that I was ready to take these shots that I was actually excited for tarp-takin'-off action. And not just because it signaled the end of the longest rain delay in Fenway Park's history.

Jack Hank had some business to attend to in the left field corner, and signed autographs (or exorcising demons?) on his way back.

Work your way up: At left, ball girl, Kelly Barons. At right, owner John Henry.

Some actual players, finally.

Manny takes the field, as the game is about to start after we'd been at the park for six hours.

As Lester took the hill, Kelly balanced a little tiny Mike Lowell on her forehead.

I tried to get Lester's first pitch, but the ump and Lowell were directly between me and him. So this is one of Lester's first major league pitches.

Ortiz on second.

A really cool view of three Red Sox infielders in the shift.

A terribly blurry shot of Manny's homer in the eighth. We thought we were gonna win at that point, but then we were stabbed by Foulke.

It would be the next day's crowd that got the walkoff win. That was the longest I'd ever spent at Fenway. Nine plus hours. For having to wait all that time without ever being told what was going on, we each got a free hot dog. Which is like salt in the wound when you're a vegetarian. Couldn't they have added "...or a food item of equal value." Terrible job. It was quite funny to watch the mad dash for the exits after the hot dog announcement. I probably wouldn't have made it to the concession stand in time even if I did dig on swine.

About baseball stuff: Lester did a nice job. Got such an ovation for getting the first guy out. With today's internet society, we all hear about these prospects from the time they're conceived, so all the anticipation can lead to love-fests. Whereas yankee fans are all "who the hell is this guy? Hey, what a great catch! And he's not a hired gun! Yeah, let's start him every day and assume everything will be fine! Start gathering footage for the yankeeography, to air after David Cone's!" Oh, wait, I can't use that as a joke anymore, as there actually IS a Cone hour-long yankeeography now.

I call mark Loretta "The Mick" now. I'm convinced someone slipped him a mickey when he got to New York. He became a different player, striking out his first two times, totally uncharacteristically, and rarely got hits. The mickey has been slowly wearing off, but look at that missed ball at the game I was at, and the behind-the-back toss. He's still a little woozy, me proverbially thinks. Hopefully the Minnesota air will fully cure him.

Pauley will be fine eventually. In fact, after the hit-barrage, he ate up some innings and settled down somewhat.

Coco does that finger-waggle with his left hand, whether batting righty or lefty.

Nixon's doing great as usual in the year we traded one of our best pitchers for a guy to platoon with him.

Seanez is apparently still with the club. Can't we just pick any other guy, maybe out of a hat, to replace him. Maybe I'm not being fair, but I just don't trust the guy, and I don't trust Tavarez, either. It's kind of like how people tell me about all these wins David Wells had last year, but I just can't seem to remember any.

I'm gonna go out on a limb with Clement and say he'll finish the year strong.

And how sweet was it, Friday night, when Papelbon blew the save, but then did exactly what he always does in the ninth to get the win? On the same night when Randy was getting his ass booed at home, loudly and consistently. The ump was giving him nothing, he was complaining and pissed, and the more pissed he got, the fewer calls he got, and the more boos he got. Beautiful. Same with A-Rod this weekend. Boo-Fest '85. Just heartwarming. Really good weekend, is what I'm trying to say. Most fun I've ever had sitting through nine hours of rain and a loss.

*After Championship


I don't know about this Superman movie. That '77 version, well, that was my Star Wars. I was more of a Spider-Man fan as a pre-schooler, character-wise. But Superman, to my family, is almost like a home movie.

I can't even tell if this new one is a remake or a continuation or what, but I have a bad feeling. Someone other than Hackman as Lex Luthor? Not happening. You might as well remake Hoosiers with Jason Alexander as the head coach.

Stand' & Da Liver Poisoners


Terrible Job As Usual, Bush

I just read a brilliant article by Tom Turnipseed.

It pretty much sums up my feelings on the al-Zarqawi issue. When I heard he was killed, I wondered A. if they had a chance to capture the guy alive, and B. were any innocent people killed, too?

Unfortunately, it's yes to both.

They knew he was in that building. Why not just surround it and take him alive? Isn't that just basic common sense strategy anyway? Well, even if it's not, I thought the message we're trying to get across is that killing is wrong. People kill Americans, and they're called evildoers. Americans kill whoever they want, and it's called heroicism, and face of the dead guy is plastered all over the place in celebration. The Post and the News both sickened me, with the big, bloated, dead face of al-Zarqawi on their covers. Inside, it was cartoons of him in hell. I think it's ironic. They goof on the whole 72-virgins thing, but their headline is "al-Zarqawi Blown To Hell." What hell? The one with the stalagtites and fire and a red-suited devil with a pointy beard and tail? They use "hell" in their headline, implying it is truth that this man is now in this place, and then they go an make fun of his "crazy" religion. It's all crap, I say.

On top of all this, a woman and a child were killed in the attack. For some reason, this is ignored by the media, as they're too excited about the fact that a dude who kinda looks like bin Laden got killed.

And the father of a man who was beheaded by al-Zarqawi had some really great things to say, as you'll read in the above linked article.

End Of CabrEra




Sunday, June 11, 2006

I Got My Nina

Nine hours at Fenway Park yesterday. Twelve minutes without rain. A picture or two to come later.

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