AMAZON VINE

This is a pretty neat idea. I’ve reviewed 150 books on Amazon.com, but my interest in it has waned over the last few years. I had only reviewed two in 2007, two in 2006, five in 2005 after reviewing 30 in 2004. I hadn’t reviewed in anything in 2008 when I received the November invite so I reviewed the last two books I had read. One was Buckley’s last book a memoir of Reagan and Peter Fonda’s autobiography.

Since Dad went into the hospital the week before thanksgiving I have read quite a few books and even a few long ones. Rather than be distracted as I assume I would have been, books offered me a diversion where I had almost perfect concentration. Amazon Vine offered me a chance to review the upcoming Yogi Berra biography and considering what I was going through it was almost a perfect offer.

Growing up, dad still had all of his old baseball mits, one being a catcher's glove with the name "Lawrence Peter Berra" on it. Have you ever caught with a 1950s style catcher's mit? They were nothing like today's gloves. A 1950s catcher's mit is not for catching but for padding. The ball doesn't actually stop in the glove. It hits the glove and then falls downward to the meat hand ready to make plays on runners. Playing with it convinced me that I didn't want to be a catcher. As a kid, I had no idea that gloves had gotten easier to use.

My first baseball game was in 1975 at the old Commiskey Park. My dad, his older brother and two other rare Yankee fans from Northern Indiana made the trip. I was 6 years old and don't remember the game because I didn't understand the rules. It was a year before I played my first organized baseball and I only knew how to play whiffle ball in the yard with dad pitching.

What I do remember about that trip was eating popcorn that came in a cardboard container shaped like a megaphone. It didn't make megaphone noise, but as a kid it was just as alluring. When the popcorn was finished I safely put the megaphone in the empty seat next to me, making sure that it didn't get damaged before the trip home. To my utter dismay some punk little girl and her father eventually took up seats on the other side of my megaphone and the girl had the audacity to pick it up and yell through it. Her father that bum said nothing. I wasn't happy with the outcome cursing myself for letting it out of my grasp. As the game went on she manhandled the thing and even roughed up the mouth end. Near the end of the game she had finally returned the megaphone to the seat between us. Now it was the prized item she was saving for later. When dad said that it was time to go and we had to pass that little shrew and her father I grabbed the megaphone from the seat and she looked at me and started to protest, but I was through the aisle before the adults even knew what happened.

I remember being proud that I did the bold thing but I also felt bad like maybe I did something wrong. It must be my oldest memory of ambiguous morality. I thought justice was on my side but maybe with time the object was actually her's especially since she probably thought the item discarded and adults would have seen it as trash. I never got in trouble or even talked to about it because dad was unaware of the entire drama.

I remember two other things from that trip. I got carsick so bad that Uncle Larry had to stop the car. I also remember going to a steak place I think called "Lou Diamonds" or something close to that. They served these rare filet mignons and I remember it tasted great. Dad said that I ate the whole thing. He also told me that we went to a Greek place and I ordered chicken but I hated it expecting to get Colonel Sanders.

It would be about 6 years when we went to our next Yankees-White Sox game. Yogi was a coach at the time and we saw him in arriving at the ballpark in a cab. Dad said that Yogi was the best bad ball hitter he had ever seen. Yogi could hit a pitch over head hit or at his ankles for a home run. The last game I saw at the Old Commiskey Park was with dad, mom, and brother John in April of 1985. Yogi was now the manager and Joe Cowley was pitching for the Yankees that day. Don Mattingly went 1-4 with a single. Carlton Fisk hit a big home run to left field. It was the fourth baseball game I had been to and the first homer I had ever seen. The Yankees never trailed in the game and with the bases loaded in the 9th, Cowley walked rookie Ozzie Guillen, a guy that was always loathe to take a walk, and the White Sox won 5-4. Guillen walked 12 times all season and never more than 26 times in any of his 16 seasons.

We were still in the parking lot navigating traffic when the radio was reporting that Yogi Berra was fired as Yankees manager. Billy Martin would return. Yogi wouldn't return to Yankee stadium until 1999 for Yogi Berra day.

I knew I was going to New York in 1999 and decided to make the trip revolve around the Yankees schedule. When I saw Yogi Berra Day I bought tickets immediately. The best I could do even in January was the upper deck behind home plate. I was also able to buy lower level tickets to see the Yankees play the Braves on the Thursday night. Though I didn't see him, JFK Jr. was at the Thursday game, and it was his last appearance in public. The New York Post had a picture of him at that game a few days later when his plane disappeared. But the Sunday game may have been even more unusual.

Before the game Yogi was welcomed back into the Yankee family with gifts and appearances by his old teammates. Mickey was gone. Billy was gone. Joe had passed earlier that year. But there were still a lot of players on hand. Don Larsen was there and he threw out the first pitch to Yogi and then David Cone threw the 16th perfect game in MLB history. It was the last game I saw at the old Yankee Stadium. I never felt like I needed to go back after that.

Anyway, I didn't mean to go on and on, but I better write this stuff while I am young before the memories are lost forever. Here is the Yogi book review:



It would be easy to string together a biography of Yogi based on malapropisms with an occasional World Series heroic thrown in for good measure. In fact, I think I’ve read that book. Luckily, Allen Barra’s biography of Yogi is more interested in making known Yogi as the one-of-a-kind catcher. . . and an above-average manager.

What you get with Barra’s book is a real understanding of how Yogi rose from humble origins and had to fight everyone including his own parents to play baseball professionally. Most scouts thought he looked awkward so they wouldn’t sign him. Branch Rickey offered Joe Garagiola $500 to play baseball but would only offer Yogi $250 and Yogi declined out of principle.

After signing with the Yankees he made so little money he couldn’t afford to eat playing minor league ball. No one thought he looked like a ballplayer. The author explains that during his service in World War II people thought Yogi was putting them on when he said that he played in the Yankees organization. And it wasn’t until another team offered $50,000 for Yogi’s contract that the Yankees paid attention.

One of the most important questions that the author raises in the book is why 1947-1964 isn’t considered the Yogi Berra era despite the fact that he won the MVP three times and was the only guy around for the entire period. With DiMaggio in decline in the late 1940s, Yogi so often carried the team while playing the toughest position in the game. He continued to do so as Mickey Mantle established himself in the early 1950s. In the Appendix, Barra puts together a lengthy and persuasive argument that Yogi was the greatest catcher in baseball history by making his case as a hitter and showing how his pitching staff seemed to improve when he was behind the plate.

Yogi’s life doesn’t end after he retired in the mid 1960s. The author does a thorough job of explaining Yogi’s season as Yankee manager in 1964, his stint with the Mets including managing them in the 1973 World Series, and then back to the Yankees for coaching and managing before ending his career in Houston. In doing so he also recounts Yogi’s rift with George Steinbrenner and their eventual reconciliation.

In addition to the life of Yogi, you also meet some other interesting people along the way. For instance, I have never read so much about Elston Howard and now I wish I’d known him. We read about Whitey Ford here as you’d expect, but we also get to know Allie Reynolds, the best pitcher and during the 1949-1953 era. We get to see Casey Stengel up close by one of the few players that seemed to understand him. The author does a good job of recounting Yogi’s friendship with Phil Rizzuto including their business partnership and Yogi’s persuasive case to the HOF veterans committee to induct Phil. The reader also learn why Toots Shor was such a popular saloon with ballplayers and celebrities. There is also a thorough recap of the Copacabana incident with many details I had never read.

Simply put, if you are a baseball fan interested in the life of Yogi Berra and/or this era in Yankees baseball, this book is well worth your time.

BACK TO WORK

I miss the blog. For the last two months it has been hard to write anything because everything seemed trivial. My dad was such an important person in my life. He shaped me in a number of ways that influenced how I see the world and he introduced me to many of the things that I will enjoy until I leave this earth. I've been watching baseball, football, and golf from my earliest memories alongside my dad. No one was more happy with the Yankees resurgence in the mid 1990s than dad. And had he lived to see the Lions complete an 0-16 season he would have shook his head insisted that they find some linebackers.

The blog is already scattered with references to dad because of his influence on me and I suspect that will only increase over the next year. It is easy to write a tribute to people who have had an influence on you and I have done so many times here. But it's not easy to sum up a person who had the most direct and lasting influence. It's going to take time to do it right and I need time to get use to the idea before I can accomplish it.

Only a few weeks before dad's heart gave out I was asked by Amazon.com to join their Vine program. They let me choose free items and I agree to review them. Being responsible for reviews and writing them this past week got me going again with words and now I'm ready to re-join my Junto brethren. The timing of the invite is curious. John was asked to join Vine over a year ago. I thank the good lord for the timing of it and I will post my Yogi Berra review on the blog this weekend.

Thanks everyone for your emails and phone calls during this unexpected life changing time. John and I have probably spent more time together in the past two months than in the last year before that and he said he's ready to come back and contribute to the blog as well. You can find his early entries as far back as 2003. I'm looking forward to him participating in our dialogue.

JURY DUTY

I registered for Selective Services in 1987 but the decades went by and I never got the call for jury duty. In Orlando, Marci got one summons after another, she would postpone her service, postpone it again, then finally go for the day, and come home saying she didn't get placed on a jury. I've been working freelance ever since we married, so I wasn't nearly as busy as she was, so I've always hoped that my name would get picked out of the hat and I'd get the nod.

It never happened until 2006, after we'd moved to LA, the world's largest court system. My first summons was to report if needed to the Malibu court. By this time, I wasn't working at all, so my fingers were crossed that I would get to sit in judgment of Robert Downey Jr, but I called in every day, and never did they need me. My name came up again in 2007, this time for Santa Monica, but again, I didn't have to appear. In 2008, third time was a charm and I got the nod to appear on the Thursday before Veterans' Day in November in Van Nuys.

I took a book and settled in for a long day in the Jury Selection room. There were about 80 of us and it was less than half an hour later when I was part of the first 40 to head next door to the criminal courtroom of Justice Steele. We all were assigned a number and mine was 4 which ensured that I began the selection process by sitting in the juror box. First, the judge had us introduce ourselves and say what we do for a living, or what we study in school, what our spouses do, how many children we have, what they do, etc. We had to disclose if we were familiar with any of the principles in the case, and if we had any prejudices which would preclude us from rendering an impartial verdict. Only jurors 1-24 spoke during this part, while 25-40 sat idly.

Then, the prosecuting attorney, Bollinger had a chance to ask the twelve of us some questions of his own devising. Next, the defense attorney, Halpern, asked us questions. The two attorneys then met with the judge in sidebar and when they came back, they took turns saying thanks but no thanks to whomever they wanted off the jury for whatever reason, which they need not state. Gone was the physician, gone was the pastor, gone was the lady whose brother was accused of murdering his wife. In all, ten jurors were dismissed. Finally, both attorneys were pleased with the composition of the jury and numbers 23 and 24 were seated as alternates. By this time, it was 1PM and we were dismissed for the day. We reappeared on Friday, but were immediately sent home for the weekend. On Monday, the judge read his instructions to the jury and we heard opening statements. Then we were done until Wednesday.

The defendant's name was Catherine, a 19-year-old Hispanic-Seminole blend from North Hollywood. She was being charged on two counts - simple battery and disturbing the peace. We had no way to know if this was her first brush with the law or merely the latest. The defense seated four witnesses. The first two were police officers and the latter two were dog owners who were at the park across the street from the incident. The basic timeline was this: one of the dog owners called the cops to report an act of vandalism after hearing a car window get broken by an unknown source. Officers Esturban and Tomlinson drove by in their patrol car and saw the defendant's younger brother, Danny, walking his dog on the sidewalk. The officers recognized the 18-year-old Danny because he is a thug with whom they've dealt with before. They decide to have a talk with Danny, and because he's rotten to the core, they handcuffed him first for their own safety.

Up to this point, Danny was perfectly compliant. Concurrent to this scene, Catherine and her friend, who have walked ahead of Danny, were alerted to the fact that Catherine's brother was being "arrested." Catherine is a big girl, and she came storming down the sidewalk shouting "What the fuck? You can't even walk down the street?" Tomlinson was acting as the contact officer, cuffing Danny, while Esturban served as the support officer, establishing a perimeter. With Catherine approaching in a belligerent and aggressive manner, Esturban held up his arm and ordered her to stop. She bitch slapped his hand away and barged past him, thus the battery charge. At this point, Esturban got Catherine against a tree and began to subdue and handcuff her. This treatment of his sister totally set off Danny, who immediately starts kicking and spitting on the officers. Tomlinson leads Danny over to the squad car and Danny uses his legs to push off against the car and take Tomlinson and himself to the ground.

At this point, Tomlinson activated a recording mechanism that he carries on his person and the next eight minutes comprise a recording that was played in the courtroom. Backup arrived almost instantly and soon there were at least a dozen cops and two helicopters on scene. On the tape, you don't hear any police brutality, only calming directives such as "Calm down! Stop resisting!" You hear Catherine only a few times in the background saying "I'm okay, Danny!" and such, in an effort to calm her brother. Danny, on the other hand, is out of control, kicking, screaming, spitting, and at one point even tells Tomlinson point blank that "You're a dead man." There's little doubt in my mind that Danny is already serving time, compliments of some previous jury.

The defense offered a gaggle of eyewitnesses before calling upon the defendant herself, all in effort to hint towards police brutality in hopes for enough of a sentiment for jury nullification that they can hope for at least a hung jury if not reasonable doubt. The story was pretty much the same, other than the cops were provoking the Latinos on the street for sport, needlessly harassing Danny and pushing around Catherine once they could legitimately claim in their police report that the situation had escalated. There was one witness who actually stated that the police told him to get off the street unless he wanted to get arrested. We pretty much disregarded that guy's testimony during deliberation, but he did provide the funniest moment of the trial.

The guy was scared to death to be in a courtroom because he most likely is not even in the country legally, and only appeared because he was subpoenaed by the defense. He brought his little daughter with him, who sat in the front row while he gave his testimony through an interpreter. When he was asked what the defendant had been shouting while she approached the scene, he replied "She was saying very bad things." The lawyer said "Can you give us your recollection of exactly what the defendant was saying?" The interpreter said "Da da da da da" and the witness said "Da da da da da" and the interpreter said "She was using some very bad language." Again, the lawyer asked for his specific recollection, again the "da da da, da da da" and the interpreter says "Do you want me to say the things?" Confirmation from the lawyer and another round of "da da da" and the interpreter says "It was bad things." At this point the lawyer asked for a sidebar, and everyone disappeared into the back hall for half a minute and when they came back, the judge had the baliff escort the little girl out of the room and out of earshot. The question was once again posed to the witness and in perfect English, without the aid of the interpreter, he says "She shouted 'what the fuck are you doing to my brother, you mutherfuckers!" Everybody busted up, including the judge.

There was another funny moment during the prosecution's closing argument. When Catherine had bitch slapped Esturban, she had called him Esturbitch. Bollinger had managed to use Esturban and Esturbitch each in their proper place until closing, when he referred to him as Officer Esturbitch. Again, the judge led the chorus of guffaws.

It was Tuesday, the week after Veterans' Day, when the jury was finally led to the deliberation room. The first order of business was to choose a foreman, and that was easy since I was the only person to volunteer. My pal Steve Whitaker sent out an email years ago to his fantasy baseball friends, directing us to be the foreman if we ever get the chance to serve on a jury. I might never get the chance again, so I was eager to volunteer. I thought it was going to be a slam dunk conviction, but once you get in that room, you realize that 12 random people have a way of hearing the same information 12 different ways. There were reasonable people who didn't have much to say other than 'guilty' but there were more than one unreasonable people who either wanted to stick it to the cops or who weren't even sure an offense was committed.

We only had 40 minutes or so on Tuesday before we were released, and I spent that night strategizing and forming mini-monologues for the next day, since I was assigned with the task of getting these random people to all agree in the end. I led off Wednesday morning by stipulating that we are all different and we have been thrown together at random to render judgment on an individual based solely on facts that were presented in the courtroom. I recommended that we in turn present our interpretation of the case to our fellow jurors, including our own prejudices and perceptions of the facts and how we would vote on each count. I went first and spoke for a long time, since I fielded everyone's questions and explained my position on everything and anything to do with the case.

My position was that disturbing the peace was a slam dunk guilty because everything was fine until the defendant started yelling at the cops and then all hell broke loose. So far as the battery went, Esturban says there was contact, Catherine says there was no contact, so they cancel out, because I don't inherently believe a man in uniform more so than anyone else. There were two ladies in the dog park, one of which had a good view of the initial approach of Catherine to Esturban. I didn't have in my notes exactly what this lady saw, but I considered her reliable, so I put the request in to have her testimony read back to us. Meanwhile, we argued on about this and that as the day wore on.

At some point, it occurred to me that everybody thought the defendant was guilty of something but we differed as to exactly what. I asked the group to raise their hand if they would like to see the defendant charged with one of the counts, regardless of which one. All 12 hands went up. Okay, now raise your hand if you think it should be disturbing the peace; 6 hands went up, leaving 6 voting for battery. We discussed each count and came to the general conclusion that even though both counts were classified as misdemeanors, battery sounded like the more serious offense. So, with the understanding that if we can't agree on a unanimous verdict, then the defendant is convicted of nothing and sent home, raise your hand if you would agree to convict her with disturbing the peace if the alternative was a hung jury. Eleven hands went up with the sole holdout adamant that the girl be convicted of battery to send a message that it is simply unacceptable to barge past the law.

When the same question was posed in reverse, ten jurors were okay with convicting of battery and not the other, but the two holdouts were not yet fully convinced that there was enough contact to legitimize the battery charge. At that point, the god in the machine, aka the court reporter, appeared to read back testimony from the dog lady. The testimony couldn't have been more clear: she heard commotion, she stood on a table, she saw the officer put his arm out and she saw the defendant slap away the arm and push past him. The court reporter left the room and the holdouts were convinced: guilty of simple battery. With that conviction settled, we revisited the disturbing the peace charge and came to a relatively quick decision that since Esturban himself said on the stand that Catherine's foul language, including her Esturbitch remark, had no effect on him and did not in itself escalate the situation, then we decided we could absolve her of the guilt that really lay with her brother in turning a routine stop into a full out police action.

Within five minutes of the court reporter leaving the room, the discussion was concluded, the paperwork completed, and I put a call in to the baliff to let him know we had reached a verdict. The principle players were gathered in the courtroom and I handed the verdict to the judge, who looked it over and handed it to the clerk to read. Unlike the movies, where the verdict is read in a manner to heighten suspense, the actual paperwork goes something like: The jury renders a decision of guilty (filled in blank) and then goes on into the legalese and minutiae. By the time the entire paper is recited, the defendant is already weeping and the mother is shooting death stares at the jury foreman.

So, in the end, the defendant got what she deserved for displaying thuggish behavior and I got a tremendous feeling of satisfaction not only for performing my civic duty in this ancient practice of trial by jury, but for serving as the foreman and using my negotiating skills to bring a room full of disparate personalities together for a just decision. Many people put a lot of energy into trying to avoid jury duty. I'm telling you, if you ever get the chance to sit on a jury, try not only to get on, but volunteer to be the foreman. It's a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

Introducing Abigail

Pictures do not do justice

RALPH EUBANKS RIP

No matter where I move UWF finds me. It shows how strong the fund raising motivation is. They publish a glossy magazine every quarter talking about what’s happening at the college. This time I learn that Ralph Eubanks passed away at the age of 86. Dude and I had Ralph for Communication Ethics and he was Professor Emeritus even then. He was a heck of a nice guy and he would talk with you for an hour about anything. He was the only professor to quote H.L. Mencken during my college years.

He was impossible to keep up with as an instructor. His talks were very stream of consciousness and the tests were fill-in-the-blank quizzes on those lectures. I guess he wanted you to transcribe his lecture and study that. I remember that Angela Hatcher came over to our dorm to study for the final, but we decided to simulate play the 1978 Yankees v. 1979 Pirates instead. Dude and I played a 50 game season with those two teams and I will never forget how fun it was, a lot more memorable than my grade in Ralph’s class. Hatcher was frustrated with us, Skinny Lynnie was frustrated with us, but Dude and I were in our element.

A year or so later we saw Dr. Eubanks on campus and I told them that were taking some sort of fiction class and decided to see the movies instead of reading the text. Ralph laughed and he said that there was no one has more ingenuity than a college student. Shortly after Dude’s first attempt at Atlas Shrugged he showed me a passage where they mention the character Balph Eubank, and we both laughed. I wonder if Ralph ever read the book.

It says that he died in Little Rock Arkansas. 86 is a good long life and Ralph was a happy man. Thanks, Ralph for being a part of our great memories.

CRASHED

I have reputation at work as someone who knows movies. I think it’s mostly due to the nature of my work, but wrapped in there is also the ability to talk art house and classic movies. My knowledge isn’t as exhaustive as it once was. I’m no longer good with what just came out and I can’t keep up with the tent poles anymore. But if you want a change of pace, I’m always good for a recommendation or a conversation.

Around last year’s Oscars, our Vice President asked if I had seen any of the nominees and what I liked. I had not seen CAPOTE which turned out to be my favorite of the group or WALK THE LINE, a solid movie even in multiple viewings. All I had to recommend was CRASH, which I had seen 8 months before when it came out on DVD. A week or so later he told me briefly that he saw it and didn’t like it. And after the Crash recommendation she stopped bringing up the topic and would say little when I did.

He took the team to lunch recently and he told us that he immediately rented CRASH after our conversation and told his wife that I had recommended it. Only, he rented the David Cronenberg version from 1996. That movie (NC-17) is about a perverted subculture that finds eroticism in car crashes. Maybe he could have weathered it, but what wife wouldn’t have been appalled? Very recently he happened upon the 2005 version and he and his wife had a big laugh realizing that they had rented the wrong one. He laughed again telling the story at lunch. What was going through his mind after seeing the first one? Who would recommend such a movie to their boss?

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I recently read THE TIPPING POINT by Malcolm Gladwell. It’s how small ideas or trends explode into sensations. A good example from the book is how Hush Puppy shoes were so unpopular in the early 1990s that the maker almost stopped production. They produced only 30,000 pair a year. Somewhere in the East Village a bohemian wandered into a thrift store and bought a used pair simply because they were cheap. This person, whoever he was, was influential enough that other young artist types started doing the same. A fashion designer looking for the hot new trends hung around the village looking for style and noticed the Hush Puppies gaining popularity and the designer decided to use the shoes in a fashion show. The show led to models wearing the shoes in magazines and within two years they were selling over 200,000 pair of Hush Puppies annually. The trend began with a few influential people and steamrolled into a style.

Gladwell uses the same phenomenon to explain why Paul Revere is famous and anti teen smoking campaigns are doomed to failure. It was the best human behavior book I have read since INFLUENCE.

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MAMA AND DADDY

Hello faithful readers of the Junto Boys Blog. SirSaunders here, I'm back from a wonderful family vacation (the first real vacation in 3 years). We went to BEAUTIFUL Savannah, Georgia and visited Fort Jackson. We then journeyed to Augusta, Georgia to visit my sister-in-law and her family. Then to the Lake House on Lake Seminole for a few days. I went to my 20 year high school reunion and realized again why I left Bonifay 20 years ago. Then we finalized our two week extravaganza on Panama City Beach where I laid under an umbrella and delighted in my happy life. But all that moving around got me to missing the Junto Boys and thinking about you fellows. I've enjoyed the recent blogs particularly Tom's "Secret" comment (I noticed that too) and Kevin's Lazarus brother-in-law article (speculation: does this hypothermia technology bring us closer to cryogenic storage of humans and thus possible long term space travel Ala "Alien?"). But I digress.

My thoughts lately have been with an eye toward the election next year and what the American People want/need out of a candidate. Truthfully, after spending a lot of time in the country and in Bonifay on my vacation, I concluded it boils down to a simple truth: Mama and Daddy. You see the American People are like children in a big family. When times are good and everything is right with the world, you want Mama. You want Mama to tend to you, care for you, wipe your mouth, clean your table, mend your clothes, bathe you, tuck you in at night and tell you that all is good with the world. You need Mama. You love her because she rocks you and makes you feel wonderful, nurtured, and loved. But then...night comes... It's 2:33am and you are awakened out of a dead sleep. You hear a crash down the hall. Has someone broken in? Is there an intruder? Hairs stand on end and you brake out in a cold sweat. Who is it you call for? It sure ain't Mama, it's Daddy. You want big strong Daddy to get his gun and search the house and defend the homestead. You want Daddy to chase off the monsters and tell you all will be fine with the world. You are glad to have him. Whew! Thank goodness for Daddy. Then the sun rises, the glass is cleaned up, the window is repaired. Life goes on. Hmmmm...it's not scary now. I guess I'll ask Mama for some breakfast. And the cycle continues.

This is why, Baring a new attack and baring a complete foul up by the candidate, a Democrat will win in '08. We've forgotten (or don't want to remember) the broken window, we just want Mama to fix breakfast again. Because really, if that bad man comes back again, then we'll just holler for Daddy, Daddy!!!

MY FRIEND SHAM

It’s been a tough July. I haven’t felt much like blogging. Our dog Shambaugh has been battling health problems since late last year and the time finally came to say goodbye. He lived more than 12 years which is quite an accomplishment for a big dog. He was born the same year as Buckingham and outlived him by 5 years. Trish saved him from a shelter back in 1996 shortly after she graduated from college. She would go to the shelter 2 times a week looking for a Golden Retriever but couldn’t help noticing this mutt made of malamute and possibly a hint of wolf. He didn’t bark like the others. The first time Trish saw him, he put his paw up on the cage as she walked by.

After seeing Sham for more than a month she noticed that he was getting pushed father down the line. The people at the shelter said that dogs get pushed down the line farther as they get closer to the end. Sham was only a couple of days away from the needle when Trish decided to abandon her retriever plan and take Sham instead. Her father was against it but her mother lobbied hard. He didn’t want any dogs around the cats. Sham was relegated to the garage, and then the kitchen, and then downstairs and finally in a month he owned the whole house. Tricia’s parents became so fond of Sham that they flew him back to Iowa during the first few winters after Trish moved to Florida.

Sham was already an older dog when I met him in 2002. Bucky had died of cancer only a month earlier. Sham reminded me of Bucky quite a bit. Neither barked often, Bucky only when I confused him and Sham only at other animals. Neither made good watch dogs, neither met a human they didn’t like. A few years ago Trish found Sham with a captured opossum in his mouth. She got angry at him and forced him to spit it out. It reminded me of the time that Bucky caught the small yippie dog in the same grip.

He would often sit between the couch and coffee table while we watched TV. It would sometimes startle him when I cheered for the Yankees or yelled at the TV for some political speech I was seeing. He was slow to new things. We lived in this house for more than a month before he felt comfortable climbing the stairs. Tricia’s mother bought him a special orthopedic bed last year and he was three weeks before he would try it out. You didn’t have to convince him to eat any kind of meat or peanut butter. He would pretty much eat it until it stopped coming. He was only a portion of his old self, but it was a reminder of what he use to be. Tricia put her Appletini on the porch floor once and Sham snuck in and drank it gladly. He did the same with beer another time. Why would a dog like beer? He was so interested in the TV that time we watched the documentary about wolves.



Sham’s decline began with his inability to jump up on furniture. I use to ask Trish why she let a big dog like that jump on couches and beds and later I felt sad when he was no longer able to do so. Last September we found him limping after returning home from some outing. Soon he could no longer climb the stairs. We gave him medicine and he could climb the stairs again, but it killed his appetite and he dropped from 80 lbs to 50lbs. We saw a thing on the CBS Sunday Morning show about giving pets acupuncture and we tried it in January. It gave him his mobility back and his appetite returned. But he hated going to the place. The lady doctor there had no bedside manner and didn’t understand Sham like his regular vet. She kept forcing him down rather than waiting for him, which only made him hate the whole experience. On top of that, the treatments were effective for shorter periods of time. Finally last week, he had gotten so that he couldn’t even get up in the mornings. He would frequently fall and just sleep where he lied. He stopped coming up to us or listening to us. He seemed by the end to be in his own world much of the time.

Not having him around has been tough. I drive home and think that he will greet me. I go out to get the mail and try to remember not to let him out. When I wake up in the morning I look over the rail upstairs to see if he’s asleep. My mind still hasn’t totally accepted that he’s gone even though I stood by the Vet in his final moments. It seems trivial to worry about animals with so many problems in the world, but its loyal dogs like Sham that make life less brutish. It was a gift to know him.

CHARITY AUCTION

I had an interesting weekend. A pal who works for Verizon scored six tickets for the Roger Waters show at the Verizon amphitheater in Irvine. It was a horrendous 200-minute drive through Friday rush hour traffic to get there but it was fun to get out and do something different. It was a strange mix of young and old at the concert. There were some guys pushing sixty who were wearing ties and cell phones as if they drove straight from work.

We were still walking to our section (the lawn) when the show was about to begin. I ducked into the mens room where the line was seven deep at every urinal. Waters took the stage and plucked out the first few chords of "In the Flesh" from THE WALL. A moment I will never forget is dozens of men, young and old, singing along while they stood ass-to-belly in the bathroom - "So ya thought ya might like to go to the show..."

I sat on the lawn with my pals for the first set which was comprised of early Pink Floyd favorites and some latter day solo stuff. People were up and down and coming and going and more than once I got my hand stepped on, so I decided to stand during the rest of the show. After a break, Waters came back and played the second set which was DARK SIDE OF THE MOON in its entirety. This was what I came for and I wasn't disappointed. The music and effects sounded just like the CD - only with a faux David Gilmour lending vocals. The wailing on "The Great Gig in the Sky" was note for note. The encore consisted of a handful of songs from THE WALL. The whole affair was kind of surreal - with men peeing through chain link fences and women puking on themselves; the venue was outdoors so people were smoking liberally and mostly it was not tobacco that I smelled. The drive home - same distance - took about 70 minutes.

Saturday night, Marci and I were invited to a charity auction to benefit the Boys and Girls Club of Burbank. Marci's coworker serves on the board and organized the event. It was "black tie optional" so I wore the suit that I bought for my sister-in-law's wedding last year and Marci wore a swanky dress. We already had $50 invested in a babysitter and weren't planning to spend very much, if anything, at the event.

Before dinner, there was a silent auction in which you bid on paper and can see what the highest bid is at any given time. We got into the spirit and bid on three items. The one we didn't win was a two-night stay at some cool looking cabin near Yosemite. There were three different photographers who had donated family portraits and for reasons unknown to me, they were priced at three disparate price points: $500, $350, and $150. First we bid on the $350 because we came upon it first and the top bid was only $130. Then we reneged on that bid when we discovered that the $500 studio was in Woodland Hills as opposed to Pasadena. We bid $165 and took it. I don't know why the prices were so different but even though we paid more, it seemed like we got the better value. The other one for $150 we discovered just as the silent auction was about to close. It didn't even have a first bid for $30 for whatever reason so we decided to stick with the other studio. Not only do we help the boys and girls of Burbank but we've been overdue for a family portrait and have paid it lip service for years, and now we've actually got a session on the books. The other item we bid on was for $150 worth of food and fun at the ESPN Zone in Anaheim. That's just the kind of thing I'm looking to do with the kids this summer so I paid $75 for top honors.

At dinner, I was seated next to the single lesbian and her brand new adopted baby. She was in her late forties and gave me the whole story about how she began the adoption process with her partner years ago after seven years of being unable to get pregnant. She was willing to take any baby that came her way and she wound up just a couple months ago with a white baby born of a college girl who had hidden the pregnancy from her folks. The baby is beautiful and healthy and it's really a triumph of the adoption process that people are able to score some good ones without resorting to the black market. There was one other baby at the event which I had assumed was accompanying grandma and grandpa until I saw baby suckling on grandma's booby. A little tidbit I noticed about the lesbian mom is that when she held the baby and gave it a bottle, she then initiated a conversation with Marci who was on the other side of me, and she completely ignored the baby during the feeding process. One thing about having a baby sucking on you boob is that you never feel closer to another human than when you are nourishing your little guy. Even the grandmotherly mommy was staring deeply into her baby's eyes during the process which is the natural instinct. It made me wonder if I was witnessing one of those nurture versus nature moments on how adopted kids get screwed.

After dinner, there was a paddle auction in which you bid by holding up the paddle at your table with your unique number on it. Before this event, my only experience with auctions were baseball card auctions from Pensacola with Tom. My all-time favorite auction moment isn't even my own, but is when Roger Thornhill shouts out "How do I know it's not a fake?" in NORTH BY NORTHWEST. There was a volunteer auctioneer to kick off the bidding for the first item, which was a little yorkshre terrier puppy. The excitement in the room was incredible with the auctioneer doing his thing and the bidding coming from all four corners of the room. The dog wound up going for $1200 to the emcee's wife who outbid the lady who sang during dinner.

Most of the other items for auction were travel packages. The final item was a three-night stay at some rich family's Lake Arrowhead home. Kim, the lady who organized the event was seated at our table by this point and when the bidding stalled at $1200, she looked at Marci and me and said "are you in?" I hadn't even considered on bidding on this package but I gave it the quick once-over and saw that it was a four-bedroom house with all kinds of amenities. I gave Kim the "we're in" response and her paddle went up. She wound up taking it with a $1400 bid. So, that last one cost us nothing out of pocket up front but come August we will pay Kim $350 for three nights of luxurious communal living with a family of our choice and another of her choice - Kim comes solo. Fellow Junto Boys are invited to become that family if you get yourself out here in about six weeks.

RECOVERY MODE

Sir Saunders came over on Saturday to visit me during my Meniscus recovery and he said two things that will forever become part of my consciousness.

While describing to him the movie, AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH, he said the whole phenomenon was an example of the PROFIT OF DOOM myth and then explained the psychology behind it. Though he admitted that he did not coin the phrase, I bet the guy who did would have had a tough time competing with Sir Saunders description. Steve promises a Junto Boys post on the matter soon.

As we discussed the war in Iraq and the incredible lack of historical perspective in the media and politics, Steve said that he thought he understood why our country changed after World War II. That was a war that we could have legitimately lost, especially after the Japanese crippled our Pacific fleet, and therefore the populace was very invested in American victory. The wars we have fought since could only be lost politically and since they can be won or lost without a change of American lifestyle, there is no public urgency to win.

It immediately brought to mind two Olympic moments that capture the same spirit. In 1980, ABC’s Al Michaels openly cheered the underdog American Hockey team to victory. In 1992, NBC’s Bob Costas apologized as the Dream Team bore a hole through every basketball team on their way to the gold. Same result, two journeys.

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I am so happy that Steve Whitaker invited me into the ESPN baseball league and Dude talked me into joining. It comes at a great time with the demise of online poker and it has really reminded me how much I enjoy baseball even despite the people who run it. After our draft in March I read THE HEAD GAME (Review Soon) by Roger Kahn (Boys of Summer). It deals with pitching through the ages. Thoughtful baseball writers can really make the game richer for the thoughtful fan.

Back and forth to the doctor’s office and when ever I have a little time I’ve been slowly enjoying Roger Angell’s SEASON TICKET. Angell has a half dozen or so books that collect his NEW YORKER pieces on baseball. This book is a collection of his stuff from the 1980s before ESPN’s Baseball Tonight when I followed baseball every week in the Sporting News. This collection brings back a lot of memories about players during our early years of the IBL.

One great piece deals with the art of catching and how guys like Carlton Fisk, Bob Boone and Ted Simmons approach it. Johnny Bench had recently retired but his lore hung over the whole discussion. There were arguments in the 1980s about how Johnny’s one handed catching style hurt a lot of other catchers who weren’t good enough copy it effectively and throw out base runners. Angell explains that it began in the 1960s when the catching glove was given a bigger pocket. Before that the ball wouldn’t stick in the glove and you had to use your second hand to catch it after the pop. My dad had a catcher’s mitt like that but it was very tough to use when we were playing ball back in the 1970s. The glove was all cushioned padding. No matter how hard anyone threw you couldn’t feel it, but it would immediately drop to the ground if your second hand wasn’t there to catch it. The discussion in the article is that the two handed method was tougher, but made the catcher ready to throw like or not.

Although guys like Pudge Rodriguez are impossible to run on, I wonder if the base stealing increase is the long-term effects of the glove change. The most interesting thing 20 years hence is that Johnny Bench, lionized in the article, is rarely talked about anymore when it comes to the art of catching. Even his teammate, Joe Morgan, doesn’t make the comparisons you’d expect. His legacy now seems to be that of a good hitting catcher. I’ve got a couple of other Angell books around that I have picked up here and there that I am going to spend some time with this summer. If you see any at a used bookstore they’re worth the small investment.

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Last week, the knee doctor said the Meniscus surgery was optional depending on whether I could live with the pain. Well, I have a high tolerance to pain and since January the pain has been worse than my herniated discs. I’ve been in an almost constant limp. I hate medical shows, but the orthoscopic pictures fascinate me. This is what my torn meniscus looked like:



See the feather-like thing jutting out? That’s the torn part. I thought it would be one simple tear, but it’s more like a frayed quilt. The doctor told Trish that the tear was much worse than the MRI indicated and that now she understood why I insisted on the surgery. All of that garbage was rubbing against the nerves and making me walk like Walter Brennan from Rio Bravo.





After the 30 minute procedure, here is the result:


Nice and smooth. What surprised me is that the surgery itself has caused some swelling and tightness, but the pain I was originally feeling was immediately gone because the meniscus has no nerves to hurt and the surgery ended the irritation. Now I just have these two little holes and some weakness when I walk. I expect to be back to work the first Monday in May. A part of me wants to get back sooner, but the doctor and the health services lady at work said that taking it slow will ensure a smoother recovery. More Angell until then.

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Drudge has been running with the Sheryl Crow suggestion of limiting toilet paper to one square per visit. The good thing about the public environmental movement is that it provides example after example of unreasonableness. The celebrities that push for limitations are easily found cheating in their personal lives. Unlike her transportation uses maybe Crow figures that she can’t be policed here and this is the beginning numerous proposals from Crow concerning things only known privately. Maybe I’m not getting enough of something in my diet, but one square won’t cut it 90% of the time for me.

Rush and Hannity both referenced this today, but neither made the comparison to the old Soviet Union that forced this behavior through scarcity of toilet paper. You wouldn’t exactly call their air and water clean, would you? But instructive in that the environmental movement wouldn’t mind creating a little scarcity and these celebrities wouldn’t lament much of life in the Soviet Union as long as they maintained their Party Membership like economic privileges.

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Now baseball and politics. Last week a columnist for the Detroit News, Rob Parker, called Hank Aaron a coward for his no comment on Barry Bonds.

It comes down to accusations Bonds used steroids, even though the slugger hasn't been found guilty.What's Aaron's problem?

Well, he needs to take a stand -- either denounce Bonds' attempt because he's been implicated in the steroids scandal, or embrace Bonds' accomplishment and show up.
Playing middle of the road isn't fair -- to baseball, its fans or Bonds.

Instead, Aaron has chosen the easy way out -- saying nothing. That's sad.

I know that columnists usually make their reputations taking strong and sometimes foolish stands. I have written some foolish blog entries, I’m sure. But calling Hank Aaron a coward misunderstands the generational gap between the “in your face” young athletes of today and the poise in which the older generation conducted themselves on and off the field.

Hank Aaron is in a bad spot. We all know that Barry Bonds cheated and Aaron doesn’t want to support a cheater. A loud-mouth jerk like Bonds would say so without a thought, but Hank Aaron took the classy approach by letting his actions speak rather than mouthing off. Parker continues:

How ironic for Aaron, who was the pillar of courage during his pursuit of one of the most important records in American sports.

As he approached Babe Ruth's record of 714 homers, critics claimed Aaron played in more games than Ruth, in smaller parks and against watered-down pitching. And, don't forget all the hate mail and racism Aaron was subjected to.

And, did he forget then-commissioner Bowie Kuhn didn't attend the record-setting game in 1974? If anyone knows what it's like to pursue a record while others try to ignore or discredit you, it's Aaron.

This is an example of a growing trend to make an argument based on similar looking events while ignoring the context of those events. No one ever suggested Hank Aaron is a cheater while Bonds has been implicated in the Balco scandal. It’s not about whether Barry Bonds has been found guilty in court. He could have subjected himself to the necessary steroid tests to clear himself when this scandal popped up years ago. Rather than clear himself he’s been running out the clock and MLB and the player’s union have let it happen every step of the way.

So Hank Aaron is supposed to support or denounce him to show his own bravery? Hank Aaron went through every hardship that Jackie Robinson did. MLB is lucky that Aaron didn’t break the color barrier now that they’re letting the pampered Bonds steal his record.

ESPN use to play the old 1950s show HOME RUN DERBY where two All-Star caliber players would matchup. What I always found interesting about the show is how the opposing player would be on the microphone providing commentary with the host as the other guy hit. They always had an “aw shucks” persona and complimented the other guy’s style and ability. That’s exactly how Hank behaved when he was on the show too.

Rob Parker misunderstood Aaron’s silence for cowardice when it is, in fact, class. That’s not something that Parker is use to in athletes he covers. That’s also something about that era in sports that doesn’t get much ink either. These guys make a lot of money now and too many of them mistake that money and fame for importance. In the fantasy league we’re playing on ESPN, you can send another owner a “smack” card and I suppose that’s supposed to be hip and edgy.

I much prefer the style that lets people compete on the field and expects them to shake hands and be humble in victory or defeat. I admire Aaron a great deal for his handling of this and I wish others could find appreciation in this last glimpse of a gentler era.

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Thinking back to Gore’s movie and that strain of the environmental movement I’m reminded of a theme in Whit Stillman’s movie Metropolitan. The affluent kids wonder about whether or not they’ll be successful in their careers and there is real worry because they have their own parents as a benchmark. Some even say that their own parents, though comfortable, feel like failures compared to the grandparents. Charlie says that one way of dealing with it is getting involved in charity work or the arts where involvement alone is seen as success because even if they are a failure at it, no one will ever know. Think of that if you see the Gore movie or see it again.

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And speaking of movie, have you seen UNITED 93? I saw it a few months ago under the duress of not looking forward to it. What I saw is the best movie of 2006. It was on HBO the other night if you subscribe, otherwise do yourself a favor and rent it. We all know the story or think we do, but the film fills in a lot of gaps about how the air traffic controllers and the military were putting the pieces together throughout the morning. And even though you know the ending, the events as portrayed on United 93 offer a hope anyway. For as bad as that day was and as hard as it is to see such brave people die, I was so impressed with their bravery and how quickly they were ready to sacrifice their lives to save strangers on the ground. It’s a glimpse into the kind of America not portrayed in our media, but one of the big reasons America is a great country.

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Also speaking to Steve’s earlier thought about World War II being a war that we could have lost and thus the united country, 9-11 was surprising and shocking and our country united because we expected it to be the first of many such attacks. You cannot measure how much Bush’s offensive strategy in defeating terrorists is the reason for no further attacks, but further attacks certainly would have created a consensus behind Iraq and Iran that we don’t have now. Further attacks would have become willingness for 10 times the casualties we now suffer. The quiet times let us slide right back into the David and Goliath perception in the media.

Bush said today that politicians shouldn’t get in the way of the Generals running the war. Reid replied that the White House said those remarks were made in the state of Michigan, but Reid believes they were made in the state of denial. Very poetic, Harry. Denial is believing those in the Middle East wish us no harm and withdrawing will end the conflict between us and that ideology.

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BAND OF BROTHERS, I think, is the best TV mini-series of all-time. Since World War II isn’t out-of-bounds when it comes to heroism and rooting for our team, this Spielberg/Hanks production is a real satisfying story and good enough to watch multiple times. I’m sure much of this is due to Stephen Ambrose’s excellent writing and respect for the men portrayed.

Good Monday, my friends.

THE MOST PAIN I WAS EVER IN

Next round.

I broke my elbow a couple summers ago and that hurt. I broke an ankle and a finger and lost two teeth in a drunken brawl and had a bad toothache. But nothing compared to that day at Geauga Lake amusement park in Aurora, Ohio.

I must have been 15 years old because Scott Shinault and I were there by ourselves, no parents, which must have meant that he drove. I have a September birthday and was always the youngest kid in my class and was therefore the last to get a driver's license. Toward the late afternoon we got in line for the cable cars that ran high over the length of the park and ran into two girls from our class. Scott fancied the one so we split up with he and Tammy in one car and me and Marlana in the next. Halfway across the park, the cars all stopped. And they stayed stopped. For ten minutes. For an hour. For two hours...

Now I happen to have a small bladder. I guess this is genetic because my older son shares the same affliction. So shortly into our wait, I find I have to pee. As the wait grew longer and longer, the pain grew more and more intense. I started examining my options. I didn't have a cup to pee in, which I could then dump out. Besides, I knew from our contests at home filling up a plastic container that I might overflow the cup and that would not be cool. But I didn't have a cup anyway. I could pee in the car but that would be disgusting. I could pee over the side, which would bring full relief, but that would draw a great clamor from the gawking crowd below. A crowd had gathered because by now the fire department was on hand, rescuing people using its ladder truck. I was not a kid who wanted any special attention, especially if that attention focused on my flaccid weiner or bodily elimination. The local news team was on site with reporter and camera. So what could I do? I just held it and moaned and waited for that ladder.

Well, my car happened to be stuck at the highest point so they rescued everybody else first. What am I going to do, yell to the firemen, "Hey, I have to pee really bad! Can you get me next?" Before the women and children. And suffer the jokes that would hound me forever. No way. So two hours into this ordeal, and having run out of witty banter about 90 minutes ago, here comes the ladder. It scrapes the bottom of our car. It is not quite long enough. They have to call in a longer ladder. You have got to be kidding.

The pain grows ever more intense. Fast forward 30 minutes. The new ladder is positioned and up comes Fireman Joe. Of course I have to let Marlana go first. Now you know when you really have to go, how you want to contort yourself into a ball to keep the dam from bursting? Try that on your way down a very long ladder. So eventually I'm on the ground, and people want to ask me if I'm okay and apologize and all that. All I want to know is where is the men's room. They point and I gimp in that direction. I manage to make it to the urinal, and of course all I want to do at that point is get my zipper down and unload, and you know how when you're so hyperfocused on something, you don't do it right, and of course I started unloading before my zipper was quite down, but at that point I didn't really care. At that point it was a wonderful transition from the most pain to the most joy.

And that is the most pain I have ever been in. For my trouble, a park official gave me a coupon for free french fries, which irks me to this day.