March 2010 Archives

One week from tomorrow, the Mets will play their season opening game, at City-Field, against the Florida Marlins, at 1:10 pm. I have been waiting many months for this, and can not wait.

The Mets' pitching staff still has many question marks, however. Despite the fact that Johan Santana claims that his elbow feels fine, after having surgery in the off-season, we really won't know until it's tested in a game situation, perhaps even a month or two into the regular season.

John Maine, Mike Pelfrey, and Oliver Perez are either coming off of a bad season last season, or injuries from last season, and who knows what will happen this year.

The good news is that despite Jose Reyes' Thyroid problems from earlier in the month, he is fine, and might even be able to play on opening day. Other good news is that once Carlos Beltran returns some time in May, the Mets hitting attack should be pretty formidable.

At this point, I have no idea how the Mets will perform this year. It's really just a wait-and-see type of thing.

If all goes well, maybe I will be able to watch the Mets in the playoffs, at the Curling club, this fall.

Why do most sports that are played with a ball, want to be Curling?

I am sure that all of you are thinking, "Cheesum crimers Rich, that's a stupid question, and a ridiculous concept." Well I beg to differ.

For decades now, sportscasters, players, and fans have been referring to the basketball, as The Rock. I don't know who actually coined the phrase, but it is very definitely part of the pop-culture of basketball. In recent years, I have also been hearing sportscasters refer to the football, and the baseball, as The Rock.

I find this to be a bit ironic since a basketball weighs only about twenty ounces, a football about fourteen and a half ounces, and a baseball comes in at a measly five and an eighth ounces.

Perhaps these other sports are attempting to co-opt the name The Rock, to make their sports seem more macho. Well, in Curling, the rock, is actually called The Rock, and it's a forty two pound hunk of granite, with a handle attached. Seems to me that Curling wins in the macho category by leaps and bounds.

So whenever you other sports players want to be truly macho, I recommend that you try the sport with the real rock.

Today's class was a blast! We had a Hat-Bonspiel, which involved selecting your team, and stone color from a hat, and marching out onto the ice with bagpipe music playing. I am not so big a fan of marching lockstep while beating my broom handle on the floor to the beat of music, but I guess it's some sort of tradition.

Today there was no instruction given at the beginning of the class. We just randomly selected teams, and got to the ice, and played a four-end game.

Our curling is definitely improving, and it showed. We placed many rocks in the general vicinity of where they were supposed to be, and I even made a killer take-out shot, on my first rock, in one end. The Skip also called for a take-out shot on my second rock, but I missed my target by about six inches. So close!

We were rotating positions in the ends, so everyone got to shoot from every position. In the third end, I was Skip, and actually found myself in the position that everyone dreams about. I had The Hammer, and needed to draw my rock to within eight feet of the button to score one, and take the end. I ended up shooting the rock with good line, but I was a little light on weight, and did not get shot rock, and ended up letting the other team steal a point. Argh! If I had a little bit more weight on the rock, the shot would have been perfect, but alas, it's much harder than it looks!

One fun little thing that happened in one our our ends, when I was Vice-Skip (they determine the score), was that we actually had to call for a measurement, to see whose rock was closest to the center of the House. Sadly, it was not ours.

When all was said and done, we ended up tying our game, but had a great time.

We were all given report cards with our class grades on them, but I think they were fake. I looked at everyone else's, and we all got the same grades. We all seemed to get the best grade you could get in every category. Maybe they were just being nice. We were also given Utica Curling Club lapel pins, which are really cool, and a membership application, for next season, which I intend to fill out when the time comes.

All in all, the class was tons of fun, and definitely worth the money. I would encourage you all to try curling if there is a club anywhere near you.

The good news is they scheduled a last minute class for some other beginners to try the sport, this Tuesday night, and they invited all of the Olympic Curling Class members to come down and throw some more rocks.

I am so there.

I just got done listening to Lance Armstrong on Tony Kornhsiser's program, discussing the big brouhaha, from the other day.

Tony apologized, and Lance took him at his word. I just don't know, though. Wife beaters say they're sorry, the next day, too.

Maybe Tony was being genuine, and really did mean it from the heart, but in some ways, the damage is done, the seed has been planted.

Either way, hopefully it's over.

Social Media is a funny thing. Until Lance Armstrong tweeted about this today, I really hadn't even heard of Tony Kornheiser. I might have heard his name once or twice, and forgotten about him, but because I pay little attention to sports talk shows, and he is not in my media market, he was simply not on my radar screen, until today.

Last week, Mr. Kornheiser was on the air, criticizing the idea of adding bicycle lanes in Washington DC, when he said this:

"The last time I looked, the roads were made for automobiles...We're going to be dominated as if this was Beijing by hundreds of thousands of bicyclists...They all wear... my god... with the little water bottle in the back and the stupid hats and their shiny shorts. They are the same disgusting poseurs that in the middle of a snowstorm come out with cross-country skiing on your block. Run 'em down... let them use the right, I'm okay with that. I don't take my car and ride on the sidewalk because I understand that's not for my car... why do these people think that these roads were built for bicycles?  They dare you to run them down."

I listened to the entire segment, and the comment started out talking about the bicycle lane idea, and then quickly deteriorated into an anti-bicyclist rant. I would never suggest that Mr. Kornheiser doesn't have the right to free speech, but I would expect an on-the-air radio host to be a little more responsible.

It's particularly alarming now, when we've recently had few high-profile court cases involving enraged drivers, running over cyclists.

I then Googled Mr. Kornheisier and found dozens of articles about inappropriate things he had said in the past, some of which led to suspensions. So, apparently, Mr. Kornheisier is incapable of being a responsible on-air citizen.

Where I come from, people who show patterns of bad behavior in the workplace get fired. Why these celebrity-types are given chance-after-chance to screw up again, is beyond me.

Come on ESPN management, do the right thing.

It's OK to use cocaine, as long as you admit to your bosses that you did it, before they see the results of the drug test.

The day my old static web site came down, naturally, all of the content went with it. That included a bunch of vacation photos from the mid '90s. Imagine my surprise when a few people noticed! Yes, I've had a few requests to repost them, so I spent an hour last night uploading them to the Flickr account that I created last year for that very purpose. No point in wasting my own disk space!

If you look on the right side-bar, you will see a link to a page called PHOTOS (imagine that). On that page I have linked to the various photo sets that I created.

Incidentally, all of these digital images were scanned from photographs, because these were all taken before the digital camera age, and even before you local one-hour photo place would make you a CD.

Enjoy.


  My Photo Page

I just got back from the second week of Curling classes at the Utica Curling Club. It's amazing how at the end of these classes I feel confident, and like I know what I am doing, but when I show up next week, for the third class, I'll be a clumsy fool, again, like I was this week. What I really need to do is get on the ice for a few hours, and just throw a few hundred stones, to develop muscle memory.

Like last week, the first twenty minutes of tonight's class consisted of a presentation, but this one was about the rules of the game. After that, we got back out onto the ice. We practiced pushing off the hack some more, but this week, we played a two-end game, and actually scored points! In fact, my team won, 2-1.

All of the rocks that I threw contributed in some way to the game. They weren't exactly where my Skip wanted them, but they were all in play. That's progress.

Next week the syllabus calls for some sort of mini Bonspiel. I don't exactly know what that entails, but it sounds like fun. Can't wait!

Oh, and about being able to get onto the ice and practice throwing some stones? I just might be able to make that happen. We'll have to see how things play out.

Ever since I became unemployed, I've been less active than if I had been working. You would think that having more time would have allowed me to be more active, but partly due to last summer being a bit wetter than average (July in particular), and me being lazy, I've not gotten enough exercise, and in fact have gained some weight.

I finally decided to do something about it. I Joined my local gym, The Fitness Mill, and started working out with my friend Joe who also happens to work at my favorite local whole foods store.

The good news is that I am really psyched to get into the workout groove, but the bad news is that Joe is literally half my age, and twice as strong. A few Mondays ago I started with him on the day when he works Pectorals, and while I wasn't doing the same weight as he, I did the same number of sets, and he just plain killed me. Two days after that workout I couldn't lift my arms over my head. It hurt, but at the end of the day I know it was worth it.

One interesting aspect about this, is that this is the first time that I've lifted weights since I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease. The reason that this is interesting to me is because when you are sick with Celiac, you are not absorbing nutrition properly, and one of the main nutrients that is not absorbed, is protein. I always wondered why I never made significant gains in any of my fitness regimes before my diagnosis, but thankfully, I now know. This makes me very excited to work out now, because since I am healthy, I will definitely show proper amounts of progress, with time, as I progress.

I'll keep you posted.

I've had a great evening, so far! I just got back from week one of the Olympic Curling Class offered by the Utica Curling Club. I made brief mention of the class in my last Curling post.

About forty eight people signed up for the class, and it looked like about forty actually showed up. The first part of the class was a brief lecture, with slide-show, demonstrating the proper mechanics of throwing a curling rock. That lasted about twenty minutes, and then they actually let us onto the ice to do more practical work, actually pushing out of the hack, and throwing some real rocks. It was not unlike last week's open house, but they went into greater detail with respect to proper mechanics.

By the end of last week's open house, I was doing pretty well throwing rocks, but tonight, it was as if I had never done it before. The twelve rocks I threw last week just weren't enough to develop any muscle memory, but after a bit of practice, I got back to where I was.

We were broken into four-person teams, and after practicing throwing, and sweeping, we played a quick one-end game against a team of all left-handers! It shouldn't surprise you that the game ended in a 0-0 tie. The good news is that each team was actually able to get one rock into play. None actually made it into the house (my two rocks were heavy), but each team did have one guard over the second Hog-Line.

Clearly we all have much work to do, but it was a lot of fun, and I look forward to the next two classes.

Back in December, I wrote this entry about the terribly engineered part that the General Motors corporation put into Saturn Ion vehicles, that sometimes causes them not to start, in cold weather.

I picked up the part at my local Kia dealership. Why Kia? Because they used to own the Saturn dealership which was right next door, and when the Saturn dealership closed, they moved the parts department next door to their Kia dealership so people like me could still get GM parts for their cars. When I asked the parts manager about the part, he knew the part number by heart (10392423), and told me that he had several in stock. I think this speaks to just how prevalent this problem  actually is.

Installing the part went very smoothly, mostly because I had read several forum posts by people who had already tackled the job, and this minimized the learning curve. Any handy person who has done any sort of mechanical work should be able to handle it, but beware, you must have a set of Torx sockets, to do this.

After the switch is replaced, all you need to do is reset the Passlock system, by going through that ten minute cycle three times. Once I had done that, the car started right up, and all was well.

As I had mentioned in my previous post, this is not a re-engineered switch that solved the problem inherent in the old switch. It will probably fail in three years, just like the original part did, but by then I will probably have a new car. I will just have to remember to sell this one in the summer, so that the problem won't resurface.   :-)

Feature 1: Sling Blade

Feature 2: Gran Torino

There has been much discussion lately about the Killer Whale trainer that was killed at Sea World, Orlando, last week. Rightly, most of it has been about the tragic loss of Whale Trainer, Dawn Brancheau's life, and the fact that the particular whale that killed her, has been involved in other losses of human life. Last night, on the Larry King show, however, the debate heated up.

Larry had five guests: Jack Hanna, who is a popular television host and zoo director that can often be seen on shows like David Letterman, Jane Velez, a television reporter and animal rights activist, Thad Lacinak, a former Sea World employee, Ric O'Barry, a former Dolphin trainer for the Flipper television program of the 1960's, turned animal activist (who I wrote about in this post), and Tippy Hedron, an actress and animal rights activist. If you're familiar with these people, then you likely know where they all come down on this debate.

One of the mantras from guys like Hanna (a paid spokesperson for Sea World), and Lacinak about the importance of places like Sea World is the education aspect. They would have you believe that it is necessary to keep these creatures in captivity so that we can learn from them, yet they never seem to talk about the millions of dollars that they make from ticket sales. In my opinion, these kinds of parks are no different than any other kind of big business where profits trump everything else. I have no doubt that the animal trainers love the animals, and want nothing but the best for them, but in a for-profit environment, the well-being of everything but the profit-margin, is typically secondary.

This recent tragedy reminds of something I read about a few years ago where some sort of traveling circus had an elephant break out of its pen, and go on a crazed rampage. People were injured, and I don't recall if there were any deaths, but the incident ended with the elephant being killed by local police.

It also reminds me of a study I once read about where they were testing the behaviour of various animals in front of a mirror. Most animals exhibited social behaviour, because they thought their reflection was another animal, but the elephants behaved differently. To see just how differently, they taped something to the elephant's face, and put the elephant in front of the mirror. The elephant saw the thing stuck to its face, and immediately used its trunk to remove the object. This clearly shows that the elephant has a sense of self. He knew that he was looking at himself, and not another animal.

What do elephants have to do with Whales you ask? Well, it is generally believed that the most intelligent animals are primates, whales, dolphins, and elephants. It is then not a difficult leap to believe that since elephants show clear and obvious signs of self, it is also very likely that dolphins, whales, and primates are, as well.

None of the debate that I have seen on this topic has even begun to come close to addressing this. The Larry King debate was laced with lots of personal attacks and vitriol, and it seems to me that even the defenders of whales are often missing the larger point.

If whales are indeed self aware, then isn't confining them to these aquaria (some call them "abusement parks"), a kind of slavery? Jack Hanna and Thad Lacinak are quick to point out that they have nothing but the animal's best interests at heart, and are in fact helping them by keeping them in captivity, but hasn't humankind historically used that argument every time it performed some horrible act against other human beings?

Perhaps in the case of this whale (and there are other examples of captive whales killing people), and in the case of that elephant, their behaviours were simply them lashing out against those who imprison them.

I think the bigger picture here is what troubles me the most.  Mankind fancies itself to be at the top of the food chain on this planet, having sovereignty over everything, which has led to the enslavement of people, the destruction of the planet on which we live, and the captivity of these whales.

I do not believe that we as a species can live in harmony, until we shed that arrogance, and treat everything within our spheres of influence with the proper respect. In this case, that respect would mean letting these wild animals remain in the wild.

Noun

1: A cocktail for those who believe that they are.

As I mentioned in my previous post, Curling Mania has taken the world by storm, and this was nowhere more evident, than at my local Curling Club's Open House, on Sunday, February 28th.

I have several friends who Curl at the Utica Curling Club, and when they told me that there would be an opportunity for me to throw some rocks, at an open event, I got very excited. Finally, my opportunity to get more intimately acquainted with the sport, and the local club.

When I arrived, I was expecting to go inside and see about twenty people. Imagine my surprise when I pulled up and found the parking lot full, and both sides of the road lined with cars for quite a distance! The Olympic Curling mania carried over to this event, and it was very exciting. I went inside, and saw most of my friends, and met many other club members.

The throngs of people were separated into small, manageable groups, and we were given approximate times of when we would be allowed into the ice. My wait turned out to be more than a half an hour, so my friend Paul, who also happens to be the ice-maker there, gave me a tour of the stuff that most people don't get to see. He showed me the compressor room, where all of the refrigeration equipment is kept, as well as the equipment that they use to maintain the ice surface. The ice-making end of it is quite a science, so getting to see that really satisfied my geeky tendencies. Paul had answers for all of the things I had wondered about over the years. It's definitely cool to know people on the inside and get special treatment.

By the time my special tour was over, it was nearly time to hit the ice. We were all lent "grippers" to put on our shoes, so that when we walked on the ice, we would get more traction, and taken down a short flight of stairs, to the ice. The first thing they showed us was how to push off the 'hack' and remain balanced. The people on TV make this look so easy, and I can assure you that it is not. I was brave enough to go first, and the moment I pushed off, I immediately fell over onto my side. A little embarrassing, perhaps, but a quick glance around showed me that I was not the only one having problems. Everyone was given an opportunity to practice that a few times, and then came the big event: our first opportunity to throw a 'rock' down the sheet. Yes, that's me kneeling on the ice about to throw a rock, in one of the photographs.

Everyone's first try at that, wasn't very successful, either. Mustering the mechanics of something resembling a proper push off of the hack, combined with a proper release of the rock, definitely takes practice. By my sixth or seventh attempt, I was able to get the rock down the ice, and near to the 'house'.

I threw as many rocks as I could, without taking time away from the others who wanted to try, and spent the rest of my time there getting to know people. I also learned about a class that they are offering for beginners, in the month of March. I fully plan to attend this class, and get as much practice in as possible, in preparation for joining the club next fall, and participating in one of their many leagues.

Should be fun!