Who Will They Play?

Baseball, right?

Last night the American League Championship Series between the Texas Rangers and Houston Astros went to a deciding game seven and Texas won. I am not a Rangers fan, but I am even less of an Astros fan so I guess given two teams I don’t give a crap about the Rangers are the better outcome.

About an hour ago the National League Championship Series started a deciding game seven of its own between the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Philadelphia Phillies. My first little league team, when I was eight years old, was the Phillies. Given that, let’s go Phillies!

Game seven is tied at one in the bottom of the third inning. Here’s hoping the Phillies win so that I can have a team I don’t hate playing in the World Series. I don’t really want to root for the Rangers again.

Also, here’s hoping the act of posting my hopes for tonight’s game doesn’t jinx anything. That’s just another reason for the Phils to win. Prove to me that my opinion has no bearing on the actual outcome, okay Philly?

Let’s go Phillies!

Saturday Morning

I slept late today. I didn’t get up until almost 8:00am. The temperature outside at that time? 31 degrees. Shit. Winter is here.

I did my morning exercise before breakfast today. Over the last couple of weeks I have been walking in place for a bit then running in place for a bit and alternating until I hit about 5k in simulated distance. Yesterday I just ran the whole thing About 32 minutes, I think. Today I did the same except I actually used the indoor run workout in the workout app instead of the indoor walk setting. I went a little over my distance goal so that I could get up to 700 calories. I ended up at four miles (simulated). My feet and my calves are hurting, but I feel like I accomplished something.

The plan for today is another small kitchen improvement project, a visit to my mother, and a visit to my father. Beyond that, I don’t know for sure. Guitar, I hope. Bond movies, I assume. I want to watch yesterday’s That Pedal Show but the topic is a Boss pedal and I don’t really like Boss pedals, generally speaking.

I just stumbled over the new clock app in the new MacOS. I opened the clock on my phone and it came up on the laptop as a handoff. Sweet. Now I can track my time between bites on my computer instead of my phone.

I started a Bond movie while doing my faux running today. A View to a Kill. The last Roger Moore. It’s better than I remembered it, but it’s not very good. Christopher Walken as the bad guy. Can he play the bad guy in every Bond movie going forward? That would be fun.

I haven’t done my pick for the World Series post yet. Game one was last night. No spoilers on my pick, but the Phillies won and I am happy. I’ll do the real post later today. The UMass Lowell Riverhawks won too, and the Bruins are off to their best start in 10000 years at 8-1-0 after another win last night. I failed to watch/listen to either game, but I followed the scores as best I could. It was the first time I didn’t listen to at least a few minutes of either team’s game. Oh well.

Last night Jen and I both threw our names into the hat to be beta testers for Jack Dorsey’s new social network, Bluesky Social. Over the last year or so this page has been the only sort of social networking service that I’ve really been using. Actually, that isn’t entirely accurate. I stopped using Facebook and I’ve nearly stopped using Twitter, but I still use Flickr and lately I’ve been using the Flickr Groups more than normal and all of that counts as a social network. I have no idea what Bluesky Social is going to entail, but if it lets me thumb my nose at Musk and Twitter a little then sign me up.

Okay, time to wrap this post up. Bond and Tanya Roberts just stole a fire engine and jumped a draw bridge and that’s not cartoonish at all, right?

Whistlegate

I have done a teeny tiny bit more than zero research into Whistlegate. I know what it is, but I haven’t watched any video. My hunch is it’s nothing. However, my assumption is that Houston is cheating somehow. I doubt it’s this thing, but there is probably something. My further assumption is that Boston, Los Angeles, and Atlanta are also cheating. My farther further assumption is that every single team in all of pro sports is cheating in one manner or another. There’s just too much money at stake not to give in to evil.

For future reference, here is a link to a story that has all sorts of video clips related to Whistlegate.

Now if we can just call it something other than Whistlegate because enough already with the *gate labels. Uncle.

Game Day – Get Hyped

Hello and welcome to the first game day for the 2021 American League Championship Series. Are you psyched? Are you feeling the hype?

If you’re outside of Boston or Houston do you care?

I just tried to read an article about what a slap in the face it is to have the two teams wrapped up in the sign stealing scandal playing each other (again) for a shot at the World Series. I say I tried reading it because I couldn’t get passed the avalanche of video adds playing on the page that would not stop running even when I manually stopped them. I closed the page and I’m annoyed enough to not even link the article at all. Screw your shitty web development. Speaking of shitty, I am using a shitty browser right now… I wonder if I can get an add blocker extension? Probably not.

What was I talking about? Oh yeah, the trash cans.

It wouldn’t surprise me at all if the rest of the country flushes this series down the toilet and gives it the worst ratings in ratings history. I actually kinda hope that happens. I am a Red Sox fan and always will be. It’s DNA. I am physically incapable of anything else. Having said that. My team cheated. My team cheated and won a World Series. Houston did it too. Houston developed the trash can banging sign stealing system so I could say that I put most of the blame for the fiasco on them, except that the ringleader was Alex Cora who is our manager.

The fact that the players were not punished is both laughable and insulting. The fact that both managers involved are back in the league is ridiculous. The fact that Alex Cora was fired by the Red Sox when the suspension was handed down, and then rehired when the suspension was up is… I don’t have the words to describe how terrible that is. How disgusting. How offensive. How… evil.

So the whole thing is just gross. If you’re not an Astros or Red Sox fan, please do your best to remind everyone of how awful this is for the league. Don’t hold back. Also, don’t watch. For those of us who are Astros or Red Sox fans. Go ahead and continue to be fans. Root for your favorite team. Rah Rah Rah and all that. Just don’t be one of those assholes who denies the scandal or defends their actions. What they did was shit. Defending it makes you shitty by association. They did it. They suck. We as fans have to take the abuse that entails. Just take it.

Alex Cora is a cheater and so are many of the players who played for him three years ago, some of whom are still playing for him now. I am still rooting for the Red Sox.

Six hours (approximately) to game time.