Author: robertjames1971

I'm wicked tall.

CD

The CD player on Dad’s stereo thing that I’ve been using to listen to all of my Rush records on vinyl works.

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I started listening to everything in order yesterday. Presto, from 1989, is the first Rush studio album that I don’t have on vinyl (did it ever come out on vinyl? I don’t think so) and when I got to that point in the catalog… I just had to listen to it. I don’t have another album on vinyl until Vapor Trails, from 2002. So I guess it’s CDs for the next four releases.

Am I a nerd? Why yes, yes I am.

Friday Luck

It’s a lucky Friday… sort of. Not really. I am being a little sarcastic.

Last Friday I was super sick with a stomach issue. Today we get hit with a big scary issue at work that has lots of people in a near panicked state.

When I say I am lucky what I mean is I am lucky it happened today and not last Friday when I was a mess all day.

Whew, right??

The Mets Didn’t Lose

While I am very happy that the Padres advanced out of the wild card round of the MLB playoffs, I am also pretty bummed that the Mets also managed to advance. Oh well. I hate New York. What’s a Bostonian to do?

I’m not doing real picks posts for the MLB playoffs, but I am going to write down which team I am rooting for in each series, even though I hate every team that isn’t named the Red Sox. Sucks to be us… again.

Anyway.

Cleveland and Detroit? Ugh. I hate them both. I guess I’ll root for Cleveland. I guess.

Royals and Yankees. Do I even have to state it publicly? I hate the Yankees more than I hate anything in the entire universe, known or unknown. Fucking Yankees.

Mets and Phillies. See above, and the last post from last night. Also, the Phillies was the first youth baseball team I played for, back when I was eight years old and hadn’t learned just how much life can suck for a Boston baseball fan (that was 1979 and the 2004 Red Sox were a long, long way off still). So I am rooting for the Phillies, even though I kinda hate them.

Padres and Dodgers. We all know the Dodgers are going to win, but I am backing the Padres because someday I want to move to San Diego, aka paradise on Earth, and when (not if, when) I do I will be a season ticket holder for the Padres and watch MLB games in a stadium where someone who stands six feet four inches tall can actually fit in the seats, unlike Fenway Park which was designed for people who stand five foot eight inches tall, max.

Really, after all of this, the important thing to note here is that the opening game for the Boston Bruins is next week. October 8th. Of course, Jeremy Swayman will likely still be unsigned and the Bruins will effectively be tanking as a result so it’s going to suck, but at least it’s a Boston team and I can be the homer that I excel at being.

I Want the Mets to Lose

I am from Boston. All New York sports teams are offensive to me. They burn my soul.

Yesterday I wrote a post listing off which teams I hate the most in each Wild Card round match up. Amazingly, the team in each series that I hate the most has lost in three of the four series. The only one left is the only series that didn’t end in a sweep. The Brewers and the Mets are playing game three right now. It’s scoreless in the third.

I hate the Mets. I probably don’t hate them as much as I hate the Yankees but I don’t hate anyone or anything in the universe as much as I hate the Yankees. The Montreal Canadians are close, but the Yankees are the root of all evil.

What was I talking about? Oh yeah, the Brewers and the Mets. I hate the Mets. I don’t hate the Brewers. In fact, I have been to a Brewers home game. It was September 5, 2007. Jen and I had been dating for a few months and we were out in Wisconsin visiting Mike and Tammy and their baby daughter who is now a high school senior.

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All the more reason to root against the friggin’ Mets.

Oh yeah, did I mention the Padres won their series yesterday? Bring on the Dodgers and the inevitable slaughter.

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Now What?

I spent the last three months writing a post about the previous day’s music progress the first thing each morning. Now that the music project is over… now what do I do? I got so used to that little piece of the routine that I feel confused and disorientated this morning. I felt about the same way when the year of answering daily writing prompts came to an end.

Now what?

Also… don’t you hate it when your candle burns out? It’s sad, somehow.

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I am such a nerd. Wow.

MLB Post Season

I suppose it’s time for me to acknowledge the fact that the Red Sox season has come to an end. My father and I talked about it in depth before the season started. We both expected them to have another catastrophic last place in the division finish with piles and piles of gruesome losses. We didn’t get that, which was nice. We also didn’t get into the wildcard race, though we were on the bubble for much of the season.

No, they finished at .500 on the nose. 81 wins and 81 losses. Not even remotely good, but a third place finish in the American League East feels pretty fantastic when we expected to be solidly in fifth place when all was said and done. Of course the fucking Yankees finishing in first place took whatever happiness we may have felt at not sucking as bad as expected and flushed it right down the toilet. Fucking Yankees.

On to the playoffs and the best of three wild card round. I am not going to make any predictions. I am more trying to decide which teams to root for now that my Red Sox are out of it. I hate the Astros more than I hate the Tigers, I hate the Orioles more than I hate the Royals. Hell, there once was a time when I considered myself a Royals fan. I don’t really hate the Brewers but I loathe the friggin Mets (great, the Yankees and the Mets both made the post season. Fucking New York). Atlanta and San Diego… I am supposed to like Atlanta because the Braves franchise originated in Boston and therefore Red Sox fans are expected to root for the Braves in the NL. Not me. They’re fine and all, but if there were a National League team that I would want to back it would probably be the San Diego Padres. Why? Because if I had to move to any city in the United States that isn’t Boston, Massachusetts, it would absolutely be San Diego, California and you bet your sweet ass I would get Padres season tickets. Mostly because Red Sox season tickets cost a literal fortune and Padres season tickets do not. Also, I’ve been to their stadium and it was wonderful. Fenway Park is a magical place. Unfortunately it’s also a pit that was designed when the average human being was a ton shorter than I am. I was actually able to sit comfortably on my one visit to Petco Park. As a (former) Fenway regular, that was unbelievably amazing to me.

So I guess in the Wild Card round I am a Padres fan this year. They won the first game of their three game series last night. Game two is tonight at 8:38pm Eastern time. Here’s hoping for a sweep, folks. A Wild Card round win would match the Padres up with the Los Angeles Dodgers who will undoubtably nuke them back to the stone age (baseball-ily speaking) and send them home for the winter. Oh well. If that happens then I guess I will just root for whoever is playing against the Yankees. The fucking Yankees.

Records

Yesterday I started listening to every Rush record I own on vinyl, in release order. I have everything up to 1987, after which they stopped releasing their music on vinyl (in large quantities at least). I have a couple of 21st century releases from when vinyl became a thing again. I’m in the office today so I won’t be playing that game again until tomorrow. I did take some Hipstamatic Shake to Shuffle style pics while I was packing up my laptop. Just because.

I’m not one of those people who thinks that vinyl is some magical thing. I just like the vibe. I also like having my father’s record player in my work from home space. It’s nice. I’ll start the Rush thing over again tomorrow at the start of the work day. It’s like having a big playlist from a streaming service except that I have to keep flipping the records.