trout fishing in minnesota

A Christmas poem 2011

2011-12-23T10:44:00.001-06:00

This is from Brautigan's "Rommel Drives on Deep into Egypt." I always think of this poem at this time of year and fantasize about having Christmas dinner somewhere overlooking the Pacific.

Abalone Curry

I have Christmas dinner every year with Michael
and he always cooks abalone curry. It takes
a long time because it tastes so good and the afternoon
travels pleasantly by in his kitchen that is halfway
between India and Atlantis.

Happy holidays, everyone.

By any other name...

2011-08-09T13:13:00.000-05:00

Pick corn. Remove from cob. Dry thoroughly. Grind into a coarse powder, sometimes called corn meal.

My dad, growing up on a very small farm, ate a dish he called corn meal mush -- corn meal cooked in water and butter, I believe. He disliked it, regarding it as barely above a Dickensian gruel served to prisoners or orphans. Among our contemporary friends, it's called polenta and is considered something of a delicacy.

The world is so full of a number of things.

Indigo bunting

2011-05-21T08:51:00.000-05:00

Like many other things in our life, the two bird feeders in our back yard are modest, and we sometimes forget to fill them. We aren't 'birders.' Mostly we get grackles and sparrows (and the steady stream of selfish squirrels). The most colorful display was a day last week when, at the same time, there was a blue jay, a goldfinch, and a cardinal.

Today, we saw our first indigo bunting. The sighting was more fun than I'd like to admit!

I'm still trying to think of a baseball pun.

Garden envy

2011-05-12T10:42:00.000-05:00

Tulips and daisies and lilies in profusion. Crocuses. Even some early-season roses. All over town, flowers are exploding in bright colors. The yards are positively bristling with blooms.

Except ours. We have, it seems, no skill or luck at all when it comes to growing things. Inside or out. Vegetables, herbs, flowers , grass -- doesn't matter. We plant it, tend it, watch it. It dies, or at best looks like a cheap imitation. The few lilies and tulips we have in our comically small garden are nice, but almost pathetic in comparison to the neighbors. I don't know why.

That may explain my affinity for the lowly dandelion. We have lots of healthy dandelions. And I need do nothing at all to make them grow! One takes one's satisfaction where one can.

The bucket list of modesty

2011-05-06T13:59:00.003-05:00

I retired today. Everybody keeps asking, endlessly, repeatedly, ad nausuem, "What are you going to do?" I mumble something about getting rich or fat or drunk and we have a little laugh. Boy, am I tired of that question.

We were all taught to enliven our writing by using 'action' words (that is, verbs). OK. I'll apply that lesson to the eternal nagging retirement question. (It's interesting how many of these can also be nouns.)

Garden
Cook
Pot
Write
Nap
Work
Blog
Walk
Bike
Nap
Doodle
Travel

Perhaps all at once.

There. Does that answer your question?

Rush River IPA and a confession

2011-05-02T09:45:00.010-05:00

Rush River brewery in River Falls, WI was reportedly founded by some St. Olaf college grads. Wouldn’t it be nice if they’d stayed in Northfield so we’d have our very own craft brewery? I sampled some of their Bubblejack IPA this week. I don’t know how it got that name. Seems like they’re trying just a tad too hard.

It’s unfiltered, so it looks a little smoky in the glass, but the taste is very bright and crisp. Hoppy. I like it, which will surprise nobody.

But here’s a confession: I’m sure I could not distinguish Rush River Bubblejack from any other IPA. My taste buds might be getting tired. The whole craft beer thing has finally – for me – grown a little tedious. So trendy and faux-rebellious that I tend to shut down. What had been a niche is now the norm. I don’t want to be normal.

Maybe I’ll start drinking Budweiser or Miller High Life or Grain Belt Premium. Yeah. I kind of like the Grain Belt idea because, even though it’s just a bland straight-ahead simple American lager, it is a regional as opposed to multinational beer. And you can get it at Target Field, where for some reason the beer of choice seems to be Bud Light. I am not going to drink Bud Light. A guy has to have some standards.

Poetry day. And a bad day for baseball in Minnesota

2011-04-28T14:09:00.005-05:00

Today is the capstone of poetry month -- it's national read-a-poem day! I have a Brautigan classic that you might enjoy. Today is also a double-header for the Twins, who are losing again to Tampa Bay. Curse you, Johnny Damon!

It's cold and damp and not quite unfit for baseball. Baudelaire would not have cared.

A Baseball Game
(part 7 of Galilee hitchhiker)

Baudelaire went
to a baseball game
and bought a hot dog
and lit up a pipe
of opium.
The New York Yankees
were playing
the Detroit Tigers.
In the fourth inning
an angel committed
suicide by jumping
off a low cloud.
The angel landed
on second base,
causing the
whole infield
to crack like
a huge mirror.
The game was
called on
account of
fear.

Schell's: Good Beer, eh?

2011-04-27T19:38:00.008-05:00

Twenty-five years ago, I helped a friend remodel a house in the Linden Hills neighborhood of Minneapolis. It was August. Hot and muggy. My pay: some cold Schell's Deer Brand beer and some very good home-cooked food. He was a better cook than carpenter.

The friend later opened a restaurant which did pretty well. I was a silent partner (except for that one weekend cooking pizza). We both made a little money off that place.

I still like Schell's beer. I especially like the fact that the little brewery in New Ulm, MN has expanded its line to include several craft beers - ales and stouts and the like. Last year was the 150th anniversary of the brewery's founding and of course they produced a commemorative beer. Actually, they produced five different limited editions, then had customers vote on which one should be the official sesquicentennial beer. The Hopfenmaltz won. I had some tonight and I concur.

Excellent.

This is not a review

2011-04-21T11:19:00.010-05:00

Joe Posnanski writes for Sports Illustrated, and I have never much liked Sports Illustrated. Posanaski also wrote "The Machine," a book about the 1975 Cincinnati Reds. I remember that team: Rose, Bench, Griffey (Sr.), Davey Concepcion, Tony Perez, George Foster, and Little Joe Morgan. Wow. A fun team to watch. But the book was kind of boring. I think some killjoy editor got a little heavy-handed. Posnanski's earlier book, "The Soul of Baseball," is much better.

Posanaski also writes a blog that is just about the best thing going on the Internet. I count myself among his faithful readers. His writing is the prime attraction, of course, and it helps to like baseball, but what's also remarkable is the comment section.

Most comments on most blogs and Internet news sites are ridiculous. They're mean, stupid, pointless, not worth reading. But Posnanski's commenters are by and large clever, smart, polite, funny, insightful, reasonable. How come?

Well, the comments are moderated, for one thing. And many (but not all) commenters aren't anonymous, which raises the level of civility. But I think it's mostly because Mr. Posnanski sets a good example. He's not a blowhard. He's modest about his own knowledge and skill. His biases are clear but he is always willing to acknowledge -- even empathise with -- other points of view.

Refreshing.

Today's Review: Maurene Brockway pottery

2011-04-17T19:02:00.001-05:00

It must have been about 1984. My lovely wife and I were at the annual summer art show at St. Kate's (we rarely missed it when we lived in Minneapolis). I bought a mug from Maurene Brockway. It is still, over 25 years later, my favorite coffee mug. A few years later, we bought a table setting from her. It was featured in a show at the Scandinavian Design Center, then in the warehouse district. We bought what they had at the show, then supplemented it by visiting her studio and choosing a few more pieces. She was very gracious. We still use those dishes, mostly on special occasions to show off for guests, but sometimes just because we want to. They are beautiful and functional.

Maurene still teaches at the Edina Art Center. I should probably tell her how much we've enjoyed her work all these years.

Review: Shiner Kosmos Reserve + Early Brautigan

2011-04-15T18:42:00.010-05:00

The good folks at the Spoetzl brewery describe this as a dark lager with some extra hops. That it is. Shiner Bock is one of my favorites, and I aim to try all the Shiner variations. I first encountered Shiner back in the 70's when traveling to Texas periodically for work. We went to Houston, Dallas, Fort Worth, and Hunstville. Never made it to Austin or San Antonio or Galveston or Corpus Christi. Shiner was, I'm pretty sure, a regional beer. I, for one, am glad it has gone national.

Kosmos Reserve is named for Kosmos Spoetzl, founder of the brewery in Shiner, TX. I'm partial to dark, hoppy beers, so this one's right in my wheelhouse. Nicht schlecht, Herr Spoetzl!

Here's one of Brautigan's earliest published poems:

The Meek Shall Inherit the Earth's Beer Bottles

When we were children after the war
we lived for a year in a house next
to a large highway. There were many
sawmills and log ponds on the other side
of the highway. The sound of the saws could
be heard most of the time and when there
was darkness trash burners glowed red
against the sky. We did not have a father
and our mother had to work very hard.
My sister and I got our spending money
by gathering beer bottles that had been
thrown along the highway or left around
the sawmills. At first we carried the
bottles in gunny sacks and cardboard boxes
but later we found an old baby buggy
and we used that to carry our bottles in.
We took the bottles to a grocery store
and were paid a penny for small beer bottles
and two cents for large ones. On almost
any day we could be seen pushing our baby
buggy along the highway looking
for beer bottles.

Today's Review: Ryan Adams

2011-04-14T12:01:00.018-05:00

Last winter, my oldest son Michael put a bunch of Ryan Adams songs on a CD, handed it to me, and said "I think you might like this." I guess he figured -- correctly -- that I like all kinds of music (except 'smooth' jazz, most hip-hop, and most country music recorded in the last decade) so I would probably like Ryan Adams. Somehow, that CD got buried among the drifts and piles of junk that cover my bedside table. I finally unearthed it last week.

Sorry, Michael. It's not that I dislike the songs. Most are perfectly serviceable pop tunes, but nothing grabbed me except "Happy Birthday," which I like very much. The slightly dissonant chord struck on the downbeat of alternate measures is cool. It perfectly reflects how I think the poor guy feels.

If I can figure out how to embed the Grooveshark widget, you will be able to click and listen right here! That is what the Internet is for.

OK. The widget thing isn't working, so here's a link to Grooveshark and the Ryan Adams birthday song. Great tune, kinda odd lyrics.

Today's Review: Twins v Royals

2011-04-13T15:29:00.004-05:00

Last night, the Twins were very fortunate to get a win in the tenth inning. They squandered many chances to score and handed the Royals a few extra at-bats. The Twins bullpen, subject of much preseason hand-wringing, performed well. The Twins hitters weren't especially good with runners in scoring position, and the runners weren't especially good at running. Highlights: Cuddyer 4 for 4 plus a walk; Dusty Hughes' spectacular catch of a looping liner; Danny V's single that mercifully ended the game. I was able to enjoy the nice weather at Target Field, which really is an outstanding baseball venue.

This afternoon, the Twins couldn't get anybody out. Getting opposing batters out is one of the things a baseball team is supposed to do. It contributes to winning. Francisco the Enigma Liriano, I'm lookin' at you.

This was a rare two-game series. It is the first series the Twins haven't lost this year.

Today's Review: Avenue Q at the Mixed Blood

2011-04-12T13:24:00.005-05:00

If I could use thumbs without infringing on a copyright, I would put one up and one down. Three out of five stars. The sound of one hand clapping. I liked the show, had lots of good laughs. Clever staging. Some cool puppetry. Some outstanding vocal performances. But...

Many critics have used the "Rent meets Sesame Street" line to describe Avenue Q. That works. The Mixed Blood production is very solid (except for a few sound glitches that night and one singer not quite up to par). I got the feeling that I'm supposed to like the show because it deals (after a fashion) with race and sexual preference and celebrity and poverty. But...

It just felt kind of shallow, which is probably not fair because I don't think the show's creators intended anything like Weight or Depth or Significance. It was fun, and I guess fun is just fine.

Favorite character: The Bad Idea Bears, played with great frivolity. Least favorite: The Gary Coleman building superintendent. Did not get the point of that at all.

Today's Review: Ranchero not worth the trip this time

2011-04-11T08:55:00.019-05:00

The Ranchero Supper Club is an institution in Webster, MN; by which I mean that it's been there forever. Webster is a very small town on the border between Rice and Scott counties, southwest of the Twin Cities. There isn't much in Webster except the Ranchero. I'd guess you could easily fit half the population of Webster into the Ranchero. People come, as they say, from miles around.

We've been there a few times and enjoyed it. Tried it again last Friday evening. The place celebrates its German heritage* by serving German beers and a few German dishes like schnitzel and kraut. The dining room is decorated with elaborate Bavarian steins.

My advice: stick with the beer. I had the Paulaner Oktoberfest** and it was excellent. The food, however, was ordinary. Dull. Uninspired. And overpriced.

* How did a German restaurant come to be called The Ranchero?
** Oh, and about that beer: The waitress asked if I wanted the full litre or half. I said full. She said litre, but I thought pint. There is a difference, my friends, between a pint and a litre.
Standard bottle o' beer = 12 oz
Pint = 16 oz
Litre = 33.814 oz

So a litre is 2.82 bottles of beer. Now, I do like beer, but it is exceedingly rare for me to consume three bottles in an evening, much less in the course of one meal. I really only wanted a pint. Really.

But, as it turned out, the meal I had was so bad that I viewed the extra beer*** as my just dessert.

*** I wasn't driving.

A Review A Day

2011-04-10T12:38:00.003-05:00

Resolutions, for me, are usually not a good idea. But I'm making one anyway: Publish at least one review every day.

The subject might be beer, movies, food, books, a Twins game or Twins player or Twins front office move or Twins field manager move, a web site, or another person's review of any of these things. I need the writing practice and feel like expressing opinions. Ready or not.

(Note: Guy in photo is not me, just one inspiration.)

Readers' Guide

2011-04-07T08:07:00.006-05:00

Why some things appear on this blog --

Milburn Wagon Works: My paternal grandmother was a Milburn and her uncle founded the Milburn Wagon Works in Mishawaka, IN (later moved to Toledo, OH). The company produced an electric car -- the Milburn Light Electric -- that cost $1,685.00 in 1917.

Brautigania: I enjoy Brautigan's writing. But then, I enjoy so many other things -- Seinfeld re-runs, Coen brothers movies, beer, baseball, sleep -- how come Brautigan is more prominent on this blog than all those other things? Well, hell, I don't know. Stop bugging me about it.

Posnanski: Been following his blog from the beginning. I was worried that, once he started writing for Sports Illustrated, his prose would suffer -- like Totino's Pizza became so boring after the brand that started life in a tiny Nordeast joint was bought by Pillsbury. But Posnanski's blog is still amazing and still free.

Poetry: It's like food. Here's one from Bill Holm's collection "The Chain Letter of the Soul."

The Decline of the Colorado

At Yuma, a retired accountant with prostate trouble
could piss across the Colorado.
"Used to be in the canyon business,"
the river whispers, squishing
along between cottonwoods,
"before I moved to California
to grow organic lettuce."

What does a man say to a river
that couldn't flood a ballpark after
a hundred thunderstorms?
Old geezer, it doesn't help --
my weeping for you.

Second Wind

2011-04-05T20:42:00.002-05:00

My dad used to have this saying about a bad penny (no, not the Tigers pitcher). Like that penny, I have turned up again on this blog. The reason: Time. With retirement imminent, I will have more of it to devote to this nonchalance, this trifle.

Spring is a time of renewal (except, so far, for the Twins offense), so come along as we explore the mundane, the prosaic, the weird. And maybe the rest of the equatorial countries! How grand.

Signing off...

2009-01-16T09:49:00.019-06:00

This is the 197th and final post on this blog. I could have stretched it to 200, but it seems fitting to fall just short of a milestone.

It also seems fitting to end with a selection from Richard Brautigan's seminal book "Trout Fishing in America." We've featured lots of Brautigan stuff, but nothing from this blog's namesake work. This will be followed by one of my own short poems and a picture of one of my recent pots.

And that will be that.

The Kool-Aid Wino
Richard Brautigan

When I was a child I had a friend who became a Kool-Aid wino as the result of a rupture. He was a member of a very large and poor German family. All the older children in the family had to work the fields during the summer, picking beans for two-and one-half cents a pound to keep the family going. Everyone worked except my friend who couldn’t because he was ruptured. There was no money for an operation. There wasn’t even enough money to buy him a truss. So he stayed home and became a Kool-Aid wino.

One morning in August I went over to his house. He was still in bed. He looked up at me from underneath a tattered revolution of old blankets. He had never slept under a sheet in his life.

‘Did you bring the nickel you promised?’ he asked.

‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘It’s here in my pocket.’

‘Good.’

He hopped out of bed and was already dressed. He had told me once that he never took off his clothes when he went to bed.

‘Why bother?’ he had said. ‘You’re only going to get up, anyway. Be prepared for it. You’re not fooling anyone by taking your clothes off when you go to bed.’

He went into the kitchen, stepping around the littlest children, whose wet diapers were in various stages of anarchy. He made his breakfast: a slice of homemade bread covered with Karo syrup and peanut butter.

‘Let’s go,’ he said.

We left the house with him still eating the sandwich. The store was three blocks away, on the other side of a field covered with heavy yellow grass. There were many pheasants in the field. Fat with summer they barely flew away when we came up to them.

‘Hello,’ said the grocer. He was bald with a red birthmark on his head. The birthmark looked just like an old car parked on his head. He automatically reached for a package of grape Kool-Aid and put it on the counter.

‘Five cents.’

‘He’s got it,’ my friend said.

I reached into my pocket and gave the nickel to the grocer. He nodded and the old red car wobbled back and forth on the road as if the driver were having an epileptic seizure.

We left.

My friend led the way across the field. One of the pheasants didn’t even bother to fly. He ran across the field in front of us like a feathered pig.

When we got back to my friend’s house the ceremony began. To him the making of Kool-Aid was a romance and a ceremony. It had to be performed in an exact manner and with dignity.

First he got a gallon jar and went around to the side of the house where the water spigot thrust itself out of the ground like the finger of a saint, surrounded by a mud puddle.

He opened the Kool-Aid and dumped it into the jar. Putting the jar under the spigot, he turned the water on. The water spit, splashed and guzzled out of the spigot.

He was careful to see that the jar did not overflow and the precious Kool-Aid spill out on to the ground. When the jar was full he turned the water off with a sudden but delicate motion like a famous brain surgeon removing a disordered portion of the imagination. Then he screwed the lid tightly on to the top of the jar and gave it a good shake.

The first part of the ceremony was over.

Like the inspired priest of an exotic cult, he had performed the first part of the ceremony well.
His mother came around the side of the house and said in a voice filled with sand and string,

‘When are you going to do the dishes?...Huh?

‘Soon,’ he said.

‘Well, you better,’ she said.

When she left, it was as if she had never been there at all. The second part of the ceremony began with him carrying the jar very carefully to an abandoned chicken house in the back. ‘The dishes can wait,’ he said to me. Bertrand Russell could not have stated it better.

He opened the chicken house door and we went in. The place was littered with half-rotten comic books. They were like fruit under a tree. In the corner was an old mattress and beside the mattress were four quart jars. He took the gallon jar over to them, and filled them carefully not spilling a drop. He screwed their caps on tightly and was now ready for a day’s drinking.

You’re supposed to make only two quarts of Kool-Aid from a package, but he always made a gallon, so his Kool-Aid was a mere shadow of its desired potency. And you’re supposed to add sugar to every package of Kool-Aid, but he never put any sugar in his Kool-Aid because there wasn't any sugar to put in it.

He created his own Kool-Aid reality and was able to illuminate himself by it.

----

This version is from the 2nd UK edition, published by Vintage in 1997. The first UK edition was published in 1970 by Jonathan Cape Ltd. Original copyright Richard Brautigan 1967.

Curiously, one of the reviews quoted on the jacket cover is from The Financial Times. The Financial Times called Brautigan "A master of American black absurdism." What?

----

Step back
-- Jim Haas

I watch you go again.
It never gets easy even though it has become familiar
A commonplace

Can I tell you this?
"Don't be silly," you'd say.

But every day seems an opportunity lost
Every parting another small step away

-----

This vase was made some time ago and sold at the Northfield Arts Guild shop. It's not my best work, but is representative.

See you around town or around the ol' blogosphere!

Truth is stranger than....

2009-01-08T12:53:00.002-06:00

Today's court calendar included this entry: "Forfieture. State of Minnesota v. 1997 Red Geo Metro."

Forfieture cases (where the state is siezing a vehicle or other property used in a crime -- usually a drug crime) aren't all that common in the county where I work. We should all be glad that the heavy artillery of the criminal justice system has been fired up in this case, eh?. That nasty person will no longer be able to enjoy the use of his 1997 Red Geo Metro! Ha! Take that!

(On 2nd thought, instead of taking it away from the miscreant, the court should make him drive it for the next ten years.)

End of the Line

2009-01-07T14:17:00.006-06:00

In a week or so, this little blog will shut down. I plan to keep up with my favorite blogs and may post a comment now and then on those blogs. And I'll keep writing, maybe even submitting some essays and poems for publication. But I have grown weary of the blog thing.

The final post will feature one sublime Brautigan piece, one amazing drummer video, one mediocre poem of my own, and a picture of a nice pot. That should pretty much sum things up.

Thanks for reading and commenting during the short life of this blog. I appreciate it.

Have a wonderful 2009!

I'll Grant You That (Part VI)

2009-01-01T15:49:00.005-06:00

The following announcement appeared on Grants.gov last week:

HHS
Department of Health and Human Services
National Institutes of Health
Optimization of Small Molecule Probes for the Nervous System (R21) Grant

My question: What function does the word "small" serve in that sentence?

Plowing right along

2008-12-29T09:58:00.008-06:00

Penelopedia and other local bloggers have noted the unusual amount of snow we've had hereabouts so far this winter. At the same time, local governments are scrambling to find ways to spend less in the face of dire economic news. The Governor -- he's so charming, with that cute grin of his -- has 'unallotted' about six months worth of state aid payments to local governments, and that's just the first of many such cuts to come.

Here's my idea: stop plowing snow. Seriously. I wonder why snow removal is assumed to be the responsibility of the government. The quickest way to privatize this function is for government to simply stop doing it. And our Governor, not without justification, believes that the private sector is more efficient than government at most things, so relying on the private sector would presumably improve snow removal, right? I would happily join my neighbors in contracting with a private vendor who would plow our street. I'd even pay a small premium if that vendor would promise in writing not to leave heaps of snow at the bottom of my driveway.

Maybe the private company that hauls garbage could equip its trucks with plows. Maybe all those grain trucks that sit idle during winter could become snow plowing and snow hauling trucks. In any case, I trust that the market -- that great engine of innovation and opportunism -- would quickly meet the demand. You live in Northfield and it snows, you either remove the snow yourself (from the place where you live or work and from the portion of the public right-of-way that abuts it) or hire somebody to do it.

What say you, Timmy? Mayor Mary?

Too Cold for Baseball?

2008-12-16T10:24:00.026-06:00

Everybody's talking about the cold. Y'know, it does get cold in the winter in these parts, but I understand why it's still newsworthy. It got really cold really fast (see the graph on Rob Hardy's blog, it's...umm...chilling). And it's the first nasty cold snap this season, which, though inevitable, still takes one by suprise.

Here are a couple of poems by Gail Mazur that I think are apropos.

Ice
Gail Mazur

In the warming house, children lace their skates,
bending, choked, over their thick jackets.

A Franklin stove keeps the place so cozy
it’s hard to imagine why anyone would leave,

clumping across the frozen beach to the river.
December’s always the same at Ware’s Cove,

the first sheer ice, black, then white
and deep until the city sends trucks of men

with wooden barriers to put up the boys’
hockey rink. An hour of skating after school,

of trying wobbly figure-8’s, an hour
of distances moved backwards without falling,

then—twilight, the warming house steamy
with girls pulling on boots, their chafed legs

aching. Outside, the hockey players keep
playing, slamming the round black puck

until it’s dark, until supper. At night,
a shy girl comes to the cove with her father.

Although there isn’t music, they glide
arm in arm onto the blurred surface together,

braced like dancers. She thinks she’ll never
be so happy, for who else will find her graceful,

find her perfect, skate with her
in circles outside the emptied rink forever?

Gail Mazur, “Ice” from Zeppo's First Wife: New & Selected Poems (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2005). Copyright © 1995 by Gail Mazur.

Baseball
Gail Mazur (for John Limon)

The game of baseball is not a metaphor
and I know it’s not really life.
The chalky green diamond, the lovely
dusty brown lanes I see from airplanes
multiplying around the cities
are only neat playing fields.
Their structure is not the frame
of history carved out of forest,
that is not what I see on my ascent.

And down in the stadium,
the veteran catcher guiding the young
pitcher through the innings, the line
of concentration between them,
that delicate filament is not
like the way you are helping me,
only it reminds me when I strain
for analogies, the way a rookie strains
for perfection, and the veteran,
in his wisdom, seems to promise it,
it glows from his upheld glove,

and the man in front of me
in the grandstand, drinking banana
daiquiris from a thermos,
continuing through a whole dinner

and the young wife trying to understand
what a full count could be
to please her husband happy in
his old dreams, or the little boy
in the Yankees cap already nodding
off to sleep against his father,
program and popcorn memories
to the aromatic cigar even as our team
is shut out, nearly hitless, he is
not like the farmer that Auden speaks
of in Breughel’s Icarus,
or the four inevitable woman-hating
drunkards, yelling, hugging
each other and moving up and down
continuously for more beer
sliding into the future,
and the old woman from Lincoln, Maine,
screaming at the Yankee slugger
with wounded knees to break his leg

this is not a microcosm,
not even a slice of life

and the terrible slumps,
when the greatest hitter mysteriously
goes hitless for weeks, or
the pitcher’s stuff is all junk
who threw like a magician all last month,
or the days when our guys look
like Sennett cops, slipping, bumping
each other, then suddenly, the play
that wasn’t humanly possible, the Kid
we know isn’t ready for the big leagues,
leaps into the air to catch a ball
that should have gone downtown,
and coming off the field is hugged
and bottom-slapped by the sudden
sorcerers, the winning team

the question of what makes a man
slump when his form, his eye,
his power aren’t to blame, this isn’t
like the bad luck that hounds us,
and his frustration in the games
not like our deep rage
for disappointing ourselves

the ball park is an artifact,
manicured, safe, “scene in an Easter egg”,
and the order of the ball game,
the firm structure with the mystery
of accidents always contained,
not the wild field we wander in,
where I’m trying to recite the rules,
to repeat the statistics of the game,
and the wind keeps carrying my words away

Gail Mazur, “Baseball” from Zeppo's First Wife: New & Selected Poems (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2005). Copyright 1978 by Gail Mazur.

"...the mystery/of accidents always contained..." Sweet music.

Enjoy the cold!

Offseason Acquisitions

2008-12-10T08:52:00.005-06:00

Major league Baseball, Inc. is having its annual winter meeting in Las Vegas. Sometimes teams make player trades during these meetings, but there are always more rumored trades than actual trades, especially for the Twins. It’s something for baseball writers and baseball fans to talk about during the long winter months.

In the Star-Tribune, one story from the winter meetings said that the Twins are looking for “a shortstop who can play defense and hit a little.” Read that phrase again. It raises a couple of questions, one of which might be: As opposed to what?

Some other useful things a shortstop can do if the shortstop can’t play defense and hit a little:

Help the umpires rub mud on the baseballs before each game.
Hang plastic sheets over the lockers to prepare for the victory celebration.*
Make sure there are plenty of paper cups in the bullpen so the relievers can play flippy-cup.
Make up elaborate and funny rules for bullpen flippy-cup.
Learn calligraphy and put really fancy numbers on the knobs of the bats and on batting helmets and batting gloves, giving the dugout some class.
Be a manager on the field.
Play with grit and hustle.
Make a festive centerpiece for the post-game buffet out of broken bats, dugout spittoons, an Ace bandage, and the rosin bag.
Start a blog.

---
* If the shortstop truly can't play defense and hit a little, he will pobably have to hang the plastic in the visitor's locker room.

Show Time!

2008-12-05T10:18:00.016-06:00

Two gallery exhibits at the Northfield Arts Guild will include some of my work. The first is the annual members' show. It opens Thursday, December 11, 2008. I will have one, maybe two, pots in that show.

The next will be my very first ever solo! Yowks! On February 11, 2009, I will have the small gallery (known as The Other Room, though I dislike the Biblical allusion*) all to myself. The show runs through the end of February, I think. As soon as that show is mounted, I will bore you with some photos (Pictures From an Exhibition?). The challenge will be to make a dozen or so gallery-worthy pieces between now and then using some new glazes and a rebuilt kiln that won't be test-fired until this weekend. Those sounds you hear are my creative gears grinding and my artistic steering mechanism locking up and my visual esthetic fluttering away like a frightened sparrow. **

Some day, I may write about the bizarre and embarrassing tale of buying and repairing that kiln. Imagine a home improvement project involving many trips to the hardware store and many calls to tech support and many "oh, shit" moments. Then multiply that by a factor of three. Add a couple zeros to the initial cost estimate, too.

It wasn't pretty, though I certainly hope the results will be.

* The Last Supper was in The Upper Room, which of course is different, but to my ears they just sound too much alike.

** Also, this simile gun seems to be misfiring.

Beer/Brautigan/Brendon

2008-12-04T08:22:00.016-06:00

The blogger who calls himself Bleeet posted a list expanding on the Biblical 'inherit the earth' theme. You can read it here.

This little blog has had frequent posts about beer.

In a rather forced attempt to bring these disparate references together, here is one of Richard Brautigan's first published poems.

The Meek Shall Inherit the Earth's Beer Bottles

When we were children after the war
we lived for a year in a house next
to a large highway. There were many
sawmills and log ponds on the other side
of the highway. The sound of the saws could
be heard most of the time and when there
was darkness trash burners glowed red
against the sky. We did not have a father
and our mother had to work very hard.
My sister and I got our spending money
by gathering beer bottles that had been
thrown along the highway or left around
the sawmills. At first we carried the
bottles in gunny sacks and cardboard boxes
but later we found an old baby buggy
and we used that to carry our bottles in.
We took the bottles to a grocery store
and were paid a penny for small beer bottles
and two cents for large ones. On almost
any day we could be seen pushing our baby
buggy along the highway looking
for beer bottles.

-----
from Four New Poets. Ed. Leslie Woolf Hedley.
San Francisco: Inferno Press, 1957.

Poetry Crush

2008-12-01T14:17:00.007-06:00

Lisa Olstein is my new favorite poet. I hope I get a bunch of her books* for Christmas this year. And if I don't I'll buy 'em my own self.

Here's a sample.

That Magnificent Part the Chorus Does about Tragedy
--- Lisa Olstein

There is a theory of crying that tears are the body’s way of
releasing excess elements from the brain. There is a theory of
dreaming that each one serves to mend something torn, like
cells of new skin lining up to cover a hole. I’m not one to have
dreams about flying, but last week we were thirty feet above the
bay—this was where we went to discuss things, so that no matter
what we decided it was only we two out there, and we’d have
to fly back together. I’m not one to have dreams where animals
can speak, but last night a weeping mare I’d been told to bridle
wanted me to save her. We discussed what was left of her ability
to take children for rides—how much trot, how much canter—
but I wasn't sure I could do it, having already bridled her and
all. I was once very brave. Once I was very brave. I was very
brave once. I boarded a plane before dawn. I carried all those
heavy bags. I stayed up the whole night before folding the house
into duffel bags. I took a curl from the base of your skull and
opened the door to the rusty orange wagon and weighed those
heavy duffel bags and smiled at the airport official. I boarded
a tiny propeller plane and from a tiny window I watched you walk
back to the rusty orange station wagon. They say the whole world
is warming by imperceptible degrees. I watched the rusty orange
wagon go whizzing by.

Lisa Olstein, "That Magnificent Part the Chorus Does about Tragedy" from Radio Crackling, Radio Gone (Copper Canyon Press, 2006). http://www.coppercanyonpress.org/

I think her re-phrasing of the sentence about being brave is brilliant. This is one to be savored.

* So she has just one published collection. That doesn't change my wish.

100th post in 2008; Robert Creeley

2008-11-26T15:48:00.013-06:00

Don at Issa's Untidy Hut posted a verse by Gary Snyder, whom I've always enjoyed. That sent me running to an old collection that includes some Gary Snyder poems. I had planned to call Don's Snyder and raise him a Creeley. But then I found the Creeley I was looking for and decided to stop there (for now).

Here it is, from "Contemporary American Poetry," part of the Penguin Poets series, 1962.

I Know a Man
---- Robert Creeley

As I sd to my
friend, because I am
always talking, -- John, I

sd, which was not his
name, the darkness sur-
rounds us, what

can we do against
it, or else, shall we &
why not, buy a goddamn big car,
drive, he sd, for
christ's sake, look
out where yr going.

----
For the 100th post on this ol' blog this year, I think the poem is somehow fitting. Especially that last warning.

A Culinary Rubicon

2008-11-24T10:50:00.012-06:00

On Sunday, I ate my very first matzo ball. I’ve had hamantaschen. I’ve enjoyed borscht and blintzes and babka and bagels with lox. I’ve had latkes and kugel. But never matzo ball soup.

Digging through a kitchen cabinet, I unearthed an old box of Manischewitz matzo ball soup mix. Don’t know where it came from. Hey, it’s a sunny but cool afternoon, not much going on – what the hell, let’s make some matzo ball soup.

It was a little salty, and I think I made the matzo balls a bit too large (didn’t realize they would plump up while boiling). Pretty good, though. Enough left over for lunch today, too.

So…cross that culinary achievement off the list!

Here's a Brautigan poem from "The Octopus Frontier" (1960).

The Winos on Potrero Hill

Alas, they get

their bottles

from a small

neighborhood store.

The old Russian

sells them port

and passes no moral

judgement. They go

and sit under

the green bushes

that grow along

the wooden stairs.

They could almost

be exotic flowers,

they drink so

quietly.

----

What kind of wine goes with matzo ball soup?

Columnists (Part I)

2008-11-19T12:05:00.008-06:00

Little Debbie Nutty Bars.

I do not believe I have ever eaten a Little Debbie Nutty Bar until today. They would probably be considered pixifood*, but something told me to buy a package from the vending machine today and eat them for desert.

Al Sicherman wrote a food column for the Minneapolis daily newspaper for many years. Just about every day, he would find a way to mention Little Debbie Nutty Bars in his column. I liked Sicherman’s column, which I guess was a victim of the deep cuts which have become common in the newspaper business**. Many columnists have repositioned themselves as bloggers, but not Sicherman. His columns have been collected in two volumes: “Caramel Knowledge” and “Uncle Al’s Geezer Salad.” He still contributes to the food section now and then as Mr. Tidbit, but it’s not the same.

Al Sicherman was the Mike Royko of the food beat. I hope he still enjoys the occasional Little Debbie Nutty Bar.

-----

Review: Little Debbie Nutty Bars taste like a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup that has been in your kid’s Halloween treat bag since 1994.

* Pixifood: a noun invented by Joe Posnanski. It is a food that you loved as a kid but cannot stand now that you're a grownup.

** These cuts could be termed 'paper cuts' yes?

An Undisclosed Amount of Cash

2008-11-15T15:08:00.011-06:00

Why is the booty from a bank robbery always described as “an undisclosed amount of cash?” Surely, the bank knows exactly how much cash was stolen. But the FBI apparently doesn’t want us to know.

A newspaper reporter I knew worked in a medium-sized town in northern Indiana. As a reporter, he felt an obligation – a burning obsession, really – to get all salient facts into the story. He wanted to know, among many other things, how much money was stolen. It drove him to distraction when the authorities (whom he naturally mistrusted anyway) wouldn’t tell him. This gnawed at him for some years until he finally decided to just make it up. Ethics aside, it worked brilliantly.

His story would be a straight ahead factual account but for one detail.

Late Monday evening, a tall man in an orange hunting vest walked into the First Regional Bank branch on 33rd Avenue and handed the teller a note. The type-written note said he had a hand grenade and would use it unless the teller emptied the cash drawer. She did and the robber ran to a waiting motorcycle, with which he made his getaway. The robber made off with approximately $5,780.00 in cash and coins. No one was injured and the money was found in a pillow case stuffed into a culvert near where the suspect
was apprehended.

Police captain John Ettinger said “Officers were able to intercept the suspect just a few miles away in River Ridge Park. He did not resist. We are thankful that the teller and customers remained calm and officers acted quickly.” Police and the FBI are continuing their investigation. No weapon has been found.

The suspect will be arraigned in federal district court Friday.

An altogether routine story. Except that the amount of stolen money is entirely fictional. My reporter friend did this repeatedly. If the FBI complained to the paper, the intrepid reporter would say he got the figure from a confidential source. The FBI had a Hobson’s choice: Give the paper the correct number or remain silent. They chose the latter, allowing our reporter to have the last word.

I am not defending the reporter – it’s probably a journalistic no-no to, you know, make stuff up. But I think it’s funny that he could stick it to the FBI. I mean, it was the FBI, the FBI led by J. Edgar Hoover! They did not like the press, and I’m sure this particular reporter made ‘em crazy.

Famous People I Have Kind Of Known

2008-11-13T12:57:00.008-06:00

Thirty-some years ago, I read in Esquire magazine a humorous piece by Ed McClanahan entitled “Famous People I have Known.” I’d like to get my hands on that essay again, just to see if it’s as funny as I remember it being. This week, Joe Posnanski described on his blog some awkward encounters he has had with celebrities. It reminded me of the McClanahan piece. *

And of course Mr. Posnanski’s blog post touched off a flurry of comments in which his brilliant readers described their own brushes with the famous or infamous. This naturally led me to make my own list, with which I now proceed to regale you. These are not in chronological (or any logical) order.

Kevin Kline, the actor. He and I were theatre majors at IU. We were in a couple of classes and one production together – a radio play based on the Apollo I launching-pad disaster in 1967. Kline was dashing and smart and funny but not yet famous.

Jack Teagarden, the musician. His quintet played a concert in my home town when I was in high school. My mom knew the piano player from their time in the Army together, so we got to go back stage. I shook hands with Mr. Teagarden, but was more interested in meeting Barrett Deems, the drummer. Mr. Deems wasn’t too keen on meeting me.

Quincy Jones, the music legend. Jones was a judge at the Notre Dame jazz festival (1969 or so). My ticket was one of the winners in the drawing for some records, so I got to meet the pianist Billy Taylor and Quincy Jones and take home a couple of their LPs. I think those old records are still in the basement.

Jimmy Carter, the President. Carter visited St. Paul in about 1979 and took a riverboat cruise. A friend recruited me as a crowd control volunteer (she knew somebody who knew somebody in the Secret Service, I guess). Somehow, I got assigned to help check press credentials at the entrance (the companionway?) to the boat. Sam Donaldson, the reporter, just about knocked me aside as he hurried by. The President and his wife said hello (from behind a phalanx of secret service guys and reporters) as they boarded.

Rudy Giuliani, the political dilettante. I went to a conference (1982 or thereabouts) in Denver sponsored by the Department of Justice. Mr. Giuliani was at that time a high-level functionary at DOJ. He gave a very boring speech one morning. Because I was on the discussion panel for the session following his speech, we shook hands as he left the stage.

Rudy Perpich, the Governor of Minnesota. Governor Perpich signed some kind of grand proclamation related to my profession. I and about a dozen others each received a signed and sealed copy of the proclamation and each had our photo taken with the governor. I gave my picture to my mother-in-law, who had been a high-school classmate of Rudy Perpich. She thought that was pretty cool.

John Volpe, the Governor of Massachusetts. My grandmother gave Volpe some money during his campaign so she got invited to a reception at his house. She dragged her darling little grandkids along, which the Governor’s staff clearly did not appreciate.

Dave Winfield and Kirby Puckett, baseball players. At the Hall of Fame induction ceremony, my eldest son and I got to meet Mr. Winfield and Mr. Puckett. Just a handshake in an impromptu reception line, but it was pretty fun. Some years later, I was walking through the Los Angeles airport when Winfield strode past in the other direction. I waved and yelled “David!” About an hour later, I realized that Winfield was flying back to Minneapolis to attend the public memorial service at the Metrodome following Puckett’s untimely death.

Tony Oliva, baseball player. Walking along the Metrodome concourse before a game, my youngest son and I ran (almost literally) into Tony O, who must have been on his way up to the broadcast booth (Tony does commentary on the Twins’ Spanish-language broadcasts). I introduced my son and they shook hands. Tony is one of my all-time favorite players. He is such a gracious gentleman.

Tony Bouza, cop and erstwhile politician. Bouza is a minor Minnesota celebrity, having been a very colorful and entertaining chief of police in Minneapolis. He once threw me out of his office. After he retired and was running for something (governor?), we played on the same charity softball team for one game. Dude could not hit a lick.

My daddy. Ok, he’s not famous, but he’s my favorite character. He’s a very kind, very modest, very smart guy. The epitome of control and class. He rarely swore, preferring some euphemism. If another driver did something dumb, dad would mutter “you hamburger” under his breath. If one of his kids did something dumb, he might say “Judas priest!” Working on getting a stubborn bolt unbolted or hammering a nail into an especially hard board, he’d say “that thing is tougher’n whang leather!” His strongest general-use epithets were “sonofabuck” or “well...hell.”

* The interwebs are so amazing. Ed McClanahan, I learned with just a few mouse clicks, turned his essay into an autobiography with the same title. The sonofabuck even has (surprise) his own web site, where you can get free samples of his writing. He’s wobbling toward geezerhood, but some of you might enjoy his stuff.

Election Returns

2008-11-11T15:35:00.010-06:00

This is from Richard Brautigan's "Loading Mercury with a Pitchfork." It's one in a long series entitled "Group Portrait Without The Lions (Available Light)"

Morgan
Part 12

Morgan finished second in his high school
presidential election in 1931.
He never recovered from it.
After that he wasn't interested in people
any more. They couldn't be counted on.
He has been working as a night watchman
at the same factory for over thirty years now.
At midnight he walks among the silent equipment.
He pretends they are his friends and they like
him very much. They would have voted
for him

-----
I am distressed by the public's seeming lack of trust in the recount process (in the senate race between Franken and Coleman). The law is clear, the procedures are spelled out, the responsible officials (county auditors, election judges, the Secretary of State) are for the most part not political hacks, the process is transparent (both parties have observers), and the courts provide a fallback. What's not to trust?

ULEV and baseball

2008-11-06T07:58:00.014-06:00

Before last week, I'd never heard of a ULEV. It stands for "Ultra Low Emissions Vehicle." Shopping for a fuel efficient car, I settled on the Honda 'Fit.' In the first week of ownership, I've used it on the regular daily short commute (25 miles round trip) and one longer drive (just over 100 miles round trip). The results: 42 and 47 MPG respectively. That's even better than expected. Fuel economy and low emissions? Nice.

I do not generally get excited about cars, viewing them as a necessary evil. This one certainly is less evil than most.

----

The end of the baseball season is always an uncomfortable time. For me, baseball is part of the rhythm of summer. Following the standings and my favorite team and players is a pleasant ritual. It always takes a while to adjust to the short, dark days with no box score, no game summary, no baselball blogs to check for highlights and funny stories.

Reading baseball books is one way to fill the off-season days. One of my favorites is "You Gotta Have Wa," about American ballplayer Bob Horner's experience playing in Japan. It's fascinating. I'm re-reading it in light of my new-found interest in Haiku and my son's studies on Buddhism. Look for a review soon.

In the meantime, think about spring training. I wonder if President Obama will wear his White Sox hat in the White House. I hope not, but won't get all worked up if he does.

Voting and a poem

2008-11-04T09:27:00.008-06:00

There were long but very orderly lines at the polling place this morning. I hung out with Carl, a neighbor, who arrived just ahead of me. We talked about motorcycles as we waited in line. Carl drives a big Harley on his daily commute between here and Red Wing, which is a lovely drive most of the year. I saw lots of folks I know and hundreds I didn't. It was a pleasant way to experience direct democracy.

I'm not sure why, but the scene reminded me of this Brautigan poem, from "The Octopus Frontier" (his 2nd collection, published in 1960).

The Fever Monument

I walked across the park to the fever monument.
It was in the center of a glass square surrounded
by red flowers and fountains. The monument
was in the shape of a sea horse and the plaque read
We got hot and died.

Spare Parts Poem

2008-10-30T13:55:00.005-05:00

Some of R. Brautigan's work feels to me like it's made of bits and pieces that he had lying around the shop.

Here is one of my own made of mostly spare parts. I say 'mostly' because I think it does have some structure and adhesion to it.

How to make autumn

Where are all these people going? Isn’t
it wonderful and amazing that there
are so many different styles of automobile?

Freedom of choice!
Choose your poison.
Put the top down.
Turn the radio up.

Do all these people really need or want
to be someplace else?
As soon as we arrive, we start planning to leave.

-------
I'm pleased the Phillies won the World Series, though watching it on the Fox network was painful, and not just because of the nasty weather. Tim McCarver continues to make odd statements and just plain stupid observations.

For example: One of the pitchers threw two changeups in a row. Timmy described this as unusual, saying that it's OK to throw two fastballs in a row or two curveballs, but a pitcher would have to have lots of confidence to think he can throw two changeups in a row. Timmy did not explain why this is so. He simply said it, as if the truth of it were obvious to everyone. His broadcast partner did not respond in any fashion at all, which usually means his broadcast partner has realized that Timmy just laid another one. But I really do want to know why. I thirst for more baseball knowledge, and Timmy did not even try to quench my thirst!

Do any readers of this blog (this means you, Rob) have any idea why a pitcher should never throw two changeups in a row?

Save the buckthorn! (Part III)

2008-10-20T09:26:00.007-05:00

According to the Minnesota Historical Society, the first official pheasant hunting season in Minnesota began on October 16, 1924. The ring-necked pheasant was introduced to Minnesota in about 1905. It isn’t native to these parts. In fact, the Historical Society says it was brought here from China. China!

Why aren’t environmentalists and historic preservationists falling all over themselves trying to rid the state of pheasant? Like the zebra mussel, purple loosestrife, and buckthorn, pheasant don’t belong here!

Pheasant probably pushed the native prairie chicken population from Minnesota into the Dakotas, so pheasant could be considered invasive. The species has only been here for a century or so, which is pretty recent considering that most animals began to populate this region ten thousand years ago, as the ice receded.

If you aren’t willing to eradicate pheasant, then I’m not willing to join the fight against buckthorn.

Smoke and Mirrors

2008-10-17T10:50:00.004-05:00

There was surprisingly little smoke (and no mirror).

Helped a friend do the inaugural firing of her wood kiln last Sunday. It was fun. She had spent three hours stacking and restacking the ware before I showed up. We spent another hour assembling the lid and putting the chimney extension up through the roof of the shed. The firing itself took about 7.5 hours. I stoked and kept the logbook for about half that time. In exchange for my help, she made room for a couple of my pots.

She is a meticulous potter, and that characteristic extends to her kiln building and firing. She had planned every detail and the firing went off almost exactly as she had laid it out. The only problem was that the damper mechanism jammed up about halfway through. The mechanism involved two small rectangular pieces of kiln shelf (silicone carbide, I think) sliding through vertical openings on either side of the chimney as it came out of the back of the kiln. She had made the shelf pieces fit too well into the slots – they swelled in the heat and got stuck, so we couldn’t adjust them. Because the kiln is made of soft refractory brick, we used a length of thin metal, like a putty knife, to make the slots just a little wider. Worked fine from then on. She was very disappointed at this design problem that she felt she should have anticipated. But the whole thing – from the clever way the removable top section of the chimney stack was designed, to the simple but effective method for keeping that stack from wobbling in the stiff wind, to the extremely precise use of a secondary atmospheric damper – was so well executed, the temporary damper problem seemed to me a minor (and easily fixed) setback.

I have long wanted to build a small gas-fired kiln for my own work and this experience helped me see how challenging that will be!

My pieces turned out poorly, but that had nothing to do with the kiln or the firing. I had grabbed them off a shelf of pots that were in the not-very-good-but-worth-using-in-a-test-someday category. If there is a next time, I'll be prepared with better stock.

New short poem

2008-10-11T13:33:00.004-05:00

Untitled

“Just get in the damn car,” he said
with a resigned sigh.
He spread his hands out slowly
and put them on top of the car.
He hung his head between his outstretched arms
and closed his eyes for a moment,
as if willing himself to be somewhere
else.
I expected anger, so his calm unnerved me.
I hesitated.
He looked up at me and nodded once.
as if to say “OK.”
He drew in a long deep breath,
got in the car,
put on his hat,
and drove slowly away.

--- Jim Haas

Capsule Review

2008-10-10T11:50:00.004-05:00

Saw "The View from the Bridge" last night at the Guthrie. First visit since the new building opened on the riverfront.

The building: Not good, except for the cantilevered walkway with a terrific view of the Mississippi river and downtown. The thrust stage is very nice, too, but that's because it is faithful to Rapson's design of the original Guthrie. The rest of the building is dark, stark, confusing, uninviting.

The play: Excellent. Outstanding. The acting was superb, especially Marco, whose pride was subtle and fierce. An understudy played the part of the lawyer/narrator. He was marvelous. His grief and his sense of responsibility were utterly convincing. And the script, of course, is just amazing, pulling the audience in. The plot is simple but the characters complex. You have to think.

Recommendation: Go! Enjoy! Overlook the stupid pop architecture but savor the powerful theatrical experience.

Let's Cook!

2008-10-01T10:32:00.010-05:00

My lovely wife made a hearty beef stew earlier this week. I was going to bring some of the leftovers to work for lunch today (it tastes even better after a day or two) but forgot.

Ah, well. Just thinking about it makes me smile.

Here's a poem by Richard Brautigan from "The Pill Versus the Spring Hill Mine Disaster." For some reason, I believe it was written in the Fall.

The Garlic Meat Lady from

We're cooking dinner tonight.
I'm making a kind of Stonehenge
stroganoff.
Marcia is helping me. You
already know the legend
of her beauty.
I've asked her to rub garlic
on the meat. She takes
each piece of meat like a lover
and rubs it gently with garlic.
I've never seen anything like this
before. Every orifice
of the meat is explored, caressed
relentlessly with garlic.
There is a passion here that would
drive a deaf saint to learn
the violin and play Beethoven at
Stonehenge.

Note to purists: I am aware that in the original, a number of these lines are indented, which gives the poem a better rhythm. For the life of me, I cannot figure out how to make Blogger recognize the indentation. I'm sorry.

A one-game season

2008-09-30T12:23:00.003-05:00

This may sound like apostasy here in Twins Territory, but I won't be all torn up if the Twin lose tonight. They played some really crappy baseball in September (as did the White Sox), so one last loss would be fitting in a way.

I hope the Twins win. If they do, I will go to every post-season game they play at the Dumpty Dome. But...whatever happens happens.

Go, Tigers.

2008-09-29T08:12:00.004-05:00

This strange baseball season is over. Almost. The Whine Sox and Tiggers play a makeup game this afternoon. If Detroit wins, the Twins are Central Division champs and will go to FL to play the Rays on Wednesday. The other scenario will not be discussed here unless needed.

I will express the same preference as most other Twins fans: Go, Tigers!

What is the plural of 'non sequitur?'

2008-09-24T09:02:00.017-05:00

While we are on the subject of haiku, here is one from Richard Brautigan's collection of poems "June 30th, June 30th."

Strawberry Haiku

• • • • •
• • • • • • •
The twelve red berries

----

Other random stuff:

Are trees musical, or is that just some silly notion made up by effete sensitive artistic dreamy people?

The idea is that trees make a pleasing noise when the wind blows through the limbs and leaves. They creak. They rustle. And when trees or branches bend in the wind, they bend with a certain rhythm or cadence. Aspen leaves wiggle invitingly.

But rabbits wiggle and make noise, too. And mice. Does anybody wax poetic about the music of rabbits or mice? Trees have been so romanticized it’s almost not fair to other plants. Yes, sonnets and songs have been written about roses, but that’s because of their smell or their color or texture, not their sounds.

Oak = Sousa march
Aspen = polka (or American folk music)
Redwood = acid rock
Jackpine = country swing
Linden = lullabye
Locust = Bach fugue
Magnolia = New Orleans jazz
Live oak = delta blues

Listening to the black walnut trees out my back window, I hear Shostakovich. Or maybe that’s my neighbor’s 13-year-old daughter practicing, I don’t know. I’m just killing time tossing this metaphor into the breeze to see where it lands, how high it bounces, what pleasing noises it might make.

Two blocks from my office is a state highway, a major east-west route across the bottom third of the state. This week, there’s some work being done on that highway, and the detour takes traffic right past my window. There sure are lots of big trucks rumbling by. Some of them are kind of smelly, too. One especially noisy and pungent truck had these words stenciled on the door: “Midwest Byproducts.” This little town has more than its share of meat processing plants, so it’s not hard to imagine what might have been in that truck.

Pool cue handles are often made of exotic woods, as much for appearance as performance. But the shafts should be made of a simple straight-grained light wood (maple, usually) for better control and feel. Shaft and handle are the perfect marriage of function and decoration. The joint should allow a wood-on-wood connection even where the joint is some fancy brass fitting with cloisonné decoration. Ivory-butted handles are pretty, but the shaft and tip are what make a cue work. Likewise, a stock made of African rosewood doesn’t make the rifle shoot any better.

Someday, I would like to drive a pickup truck with flames painted on the side.

Playoff Atmosphere

2008-09-23T17:39:00.004-05:00

The Twins host the White Sox tonight in the first of a three-game series. I will be unable to attend, but eldest son will be in our season ticket seats. This series is the season.

A few years ago, eldest son and I were lucky enough to be at US Cellular (New Comiskey) in Chicago when the Twins beat the White Sox to clinch the division. That was fun. During that off-season, Mark Buehrle, Sox starting pitcher, said something like, "Sure, the Twins were the division's best on paper..." Ummm, Mark? I distinctly remember the Twins winning it on the field. On your field.

Go, Twins.

[Update Sept. 24: Twins won last night. Mr. Buehrle starts for the White Sox tonight.] [Update Sept. 26: Twins won again. Buehrle pitched well, but the Twins managed to eke out the one-run win. The third game of the series is tonight. Twins win and they take a slim half-game lead in the division. It's kind of exciting!]

Bridges

2008-09-19T09:25:00.006-05:00

We’ve all heard quite enough about the infamous ‘bridge to nowhere’ in Alaska. And yesterday, the new I-35W bridge over the Mississippi in Minneapolis opened. So bridges are on my mind.

Italy has its own bridge controversy going. For decades, some folks have advocated a bridge between Sicily and the mainland (Reggio di Calabria), over the Straits of Messina. The project has been on-again, off-again while the merry-go-round that is the Italian government tries to finally decide. Silvio Berlusconi, the once and current Prime Minister, is all for it.

This would be a very costly proposition – 4.4 billion Euros, which is somewhere near 3.1 billion dollars. The bridge would be about 2.5 miles long, so that’s more than a billion per mile. Yikes! And a major fault line runs right under the proposed bridge route. The bridge would cut the crossing time in half – but that means saving all of 15 minutes!

People have been crossing that narrow strip of water in boats ever since boats were invented. The huge ferries and the hydrofoils (see photo at left) are famous. And they work quite well. I have enjoyed two crossings -- admittedly as just a wide-eyed tourist.

Bridges can be beautiful, famous, iconic. But I wonder if this isn’t just a big ego thing for Mr. Berlusconi (and a power thing for mainland interests). Pyramids are passé, and Italian prime ministers don’t build palatial libraries like ex-presidents in the USA do. So maybe a big fancy bridge with his name on it is Berlusconi’s best shot at immortality. He made his considerable fortune in the automobile industry, so his championing a bridge for cars should be no surprise.

I guess that’s my biggest objection. The bridge celebrates the hegemony of the automobile at the expense of everything else – history, tradition, serenity, sanity. Sicily, like most other islands, has its own languorous pace. Please, Mr. Berlusconi, don’t wreck that.

The smiling calf

2008-09-18T08:56:00.001-05:00

Driving home from work yesterday, I saw a calf run free. It was a beautiful day, and the calf had managed to get out of the fenced field. She was running down the side of the road – skipping, if a calf can do that – enjoying her sudden freedom. She started to cross the road in front of me. I stopped, she stopped, and the few cars behind me stopped. We waited for her to make up her mind. She turned and ran on down the side of the road.

I never knew a 500 lb animal could be frisky. I never knew a dour-faced bovine could look happy. I do hope she got home all right, where she might get a good meal and a refreshing drink. Where she could tell the others of her brief adventure.

Four haiku

2008-09-13T10:34:00.005-05:00

Just for fun, inspired by reading some classic haiku (Basho, Issa, Buson), I wrote these.

Yellow leaves floating
on the green slow-moving river;
where will they end up?

-----

Make the dough early;
it may take longer to rise
on this cool fall day

----

Parking enforcement.
Can there be a job less fun?
Yes, but very few.

----

In baseball and life
it’s the little things that count;
wins losses ups downs

----

These are not the ones submitted to Issa's Untidy Hut in response to the Basho Haiku Challenge. Those are better!

Buncha unrelated junk 'n' stuff

2008-09-09T14:39:00.015-05:00

Issa's Untidy Hut (see link at right) is sponsoring the Basho Haiku Challenge. I've already submitted four haiku. Winner gets a poem or two published in The Lilliput Review (or at least posted on IUT blog) and a new book with the complete collection of Basho's verses. Contest runs for another couple of weeks. Join in!

Twins bullpen has been bad. The clever folks at Alright Hamilton! (see link at right) have written a blues song about the bullpen. Check it out. It begs to be recorded and played on the day the Twins are eliminated.

Every September, Northfield holds a community festival commemorating the foiled bank raid by the James-Younger gang in 1876. It's over for another year. We try to avoid the crowds but do enjoy at least one greasy meal. This year the line was so long for sish kebabs that I settled for a pulled pork sandwich with some BBQ sauce. It wasn't very good. Also in September, school resumes. So the two events -- school and The Defeat of Jesse James Days (DJJD) -- always prompt me to re-read Richard Brautigan's little gem:

The Memoirs of Jesse James
I remember all those thousands of hours
that I spent in grade school watching the clock,
waiting for recess or lunch or to go home. Waiting: for anything but school.
My teachers could easily have ridden with Jesse James
for all the time they stole from me.

Primary elections were held today. The secretary of state predicted that about 15% of eligible voters will show up at the polls today, which I gather is about normal for a primary. But in Northfield, seven candidates are running for mayor. After today's primary, the two biggest vote-getters will sqaure off in the general election. The race has garnered quite a bit of interest locally for a variety of reasons.

The incumbent is running even though he was locked out of his city hall office by the city council (they can't fire him) and was found by an independent investigator to have acted improperly by trying to get the city to locate a new municipal liquor store on property owned by his son.

Anther candidate is a city council member who nearly lost his city council seat because he moved out of his district. "Moved out" is a charitable way to put it. He was evicted for not paying rent, which is the third time that has happened to him in recent years.

Another is a former mayor who did a good job the first time around. This time, one of his ideas is to give the city council the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) test. He might be kidding. I hope he's kidding.

The Original Maverick

2008-09-05T14:54:00.007-05:00

James Garner was the original Maverick, not John McCain.

My dad thinks we may be related to Sarah Palin. His mom's sister (my great aunt) married a guy named Palin. The sisters grew up in Bristol, IN, which as everyone has learned this week is also the name of one of Governor Palin's daughters. I haven't researched it yet, but if it turns out that we are related, I still probably won't vote for her.

Sorry, Guvnah.

Here's a Brautigan poem from "Rommel Drives on Deep into Egypt." For me, it captures the mood coming out of St. Paul this week.

Feasting and Drinking Went on Far into the Night

Feasting and drinking went on far into the night
but in the end we went home alone to console ourselves
which seems to be what so many things are all about
like the branches of a tree just after the wind
stops blowing.

Haiku education

2008-08-30T10:34:00.016-05:00

"The Essential Haiku: Versions of Basho, Buson, and Issa" by Robert Hass, The Ecco Press 1994.

An attractive feature of many poetic forms like the sonnet or the haiku is structure. The writer's challenge is to be true to the form (lines, syllables, meter) and be original at the same time.

I always shied from the challenge, retreating (if you will) to free verse.

Now, reading Hass' history of the Haiku form, I discover that the rules we were taught in high school (17 syllables divided into 3 lines [5/7/5]) aren't really a big part of the haiku at all. What a liberating revelation!

Hass says that the important characteristics of Haiku are (aside from the three-line form) a reference to time or season, personalization (that is, the subject is something the writer experiences directly and in the present), and a sense that the observation is both simple and connected to something more. Humor is also frequent, though not required.

Hass* was the verse translator for this volume and there are some essays translated by others.

My favorite by Basho:

A cicada shell;
It sang itself
utterly away.

The cicadas are putting on a concert in my yard as I write this, four centuries after Basho wrote those words.

----

*My dad's name is Robert Haas. Not the same guy.

The Ale Contest is Over

2008-08-26T20:06:00.011-05:00

The winner is: Bell's Amber Ale from Comstock, Michigan. (Cheers, huzzahs, confetti, fireworks, medals, tearful speeches about sacrifice and persistence and loyalty, endorsement deals...)

2nd place: Fat Tire from Fort Collins, Colorado

Honorable mention:
Summit Extra Pale Ale, St. Paul
Sierra Nevada Anniversary Ale and Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, Chico, CA
Boulevard Ale, Kansas City
Schell's Pale Ale, New Ulm, MN
Goose Island Hex Nut Brown Ale, Chicago
James Page Burly Brown Ale, Stevens Point, Wisconsin
Full Sail Ale, Hood River, Oregon
Bell's Oberon Ale, Comstock, Michigan
Avalanche Ale, Breckenridge Brewing Co., Colorado

Note: These results have not been certified. They could change tomorrow.

We are So Green!

2008-08-25T13:36:00.016-05:00

I make fun of environmentalists, mostly because zealots of any stripe bug me. But in many small ways we do try to act responsibly toward the air and water and soil.

For example:

Washed the car on the lawn and not the driveway. I don't wash the car very often, but this summer the water is going into the grass and not the gutter.

Got a rain barrel. For watering our comically small garden and the lovely flowers my wife planted by the front door, the rain barrel works great.

Burned E-85. Yes there is tremendous controversy about whether ethanol production is good or bad for the environment, but one thing is clear: burning it in your car instead of gasoline produces fewer emissions. Here's hoping that some other fiber will replace corn as the main source of ethanol.

Hung laundry outside to dry. Some suburbs have outlawed this practice. Do it anyway.

Recycled trash. We've always been faithful recyclers. This summer, the county where we live finally switched to a 'single-sort' system so we no longer have to have separate containers for cardboard, paper, metal, glass, and plastic. Single-sort makes it a lot easier for us, a little cheaper for the hauler, and a little cheaper for the county recycling facility. I'm told recycling participation may double with the new system. That's a good thing, isn't it?

Recycled printer cartridges. Some businesses hereabouts have put in ink-jet cartridge recycling boxes, making it more convenient to get rid of these.

Recycled furniture. I was all for hauling a bunch of used furniture from our basement to the dump. How we accumulated all this is a closely-guarded family secret. Suffice it to say that the basement is chock full of tables and chairs and couches and dressers that we will never use. My wife (who is more tolerant, caring, and frugal than I) found somebody to give it to. Hooray!

Used hand tools. My neighbor loves power tools. He attacks his driveway with a huge snow blower in the winter and a whiny, smoke-spewing leaf blower in the fall. He's on a military mission and has the ordnance to support it. We could have borrowed one of his chain saws, but I just handed my son a bow saw and sent him into the trees to trim the deadwood.

Took the Megabus. Mass transportation! For the masses!

Re-used packaging. We sold a bunch of textbooks via Amazon.com Marketplace. Reselling textbooks is an ancient recycling ritual in college towns, but we also re-used packing material that I had saved.

These ten little things make me feel better even though they probably don't mean a damned thing in the grand sweep of history.

A Little Bit Famous

2008-08-22T11:29:00.017-05:00

Walter Trout
(considered by some to be
among the best blues guitarists ever).

My sister lives in Indiana, not far from Indianapolis. Her son (my nephew) plays in a band there. Last week, we were comparing the local music scenes of the Twin Cities and Indianapolis. She mentioned that Duke Tumatoe is still playing bars in and around Indianapolis. Wow, I said, that guy’s getting kind of old. I remember Duke Tumatoe and the All-Star Frogs from 30 years ago, when I lived in Champaign, IL and he had frequent gigs there.

I compared him to Walter Trout as a “second tier” artist – someone very very good but who never quite hit the big time. Walter Trout is bigger in Europe than in his native USA.

Yesterday, I picked up a Shannon Curfman CD at the library. She made a big splash a few years ago (her “Loud Guitars, Big Suspicions” CD was recorded in Minneapolis in 1999) and then disappeared – at least from my limited radar. She’s good – mean blues guitar, pretty good songwriter, very good singer. So how come she’s not a star? She’s still doing lots of gigs – summer blues festivals in the Midwest, some bar shows, the national anthem at an upcoming Vikings game – but she doesn’t draw like Cheryl Crow or even Lucy Kaplanski.

Is music a meritocracy (George Will is fond of saying that baseball is almost a pure meritocracy)?

Check out Ms. Curfman or Walter Trout or Duke Tumatoe and see if you can figure out why they aren’t on the radio every day.

Simplicity

2008-08-21T09:11:00.004-05:00

Mowing the grass

My dad loved mowing.
And his sidewalk and driveway were
always cleared of snow edge to edge
even if that meant shoveling several times a day.

He didn’t do this out of a sense of obligation
or to show up the neighbors
or because he was obsessively neat.

No.

He found pleasure in a simple task well done.

Splitting firewood
Tuning an engine
Harvesting strawberries just before the peak of ripeness
Mowing the grass

---

Transporting Yourself To Another Place

2008-08-18T15:24:00.016-05:00

Imagining myself somewhere else is easy. I do it quite a bit.
Getting myself to some distant place in the real world is sometimes difficult and unpleasant. Not as bad as the guy in the Odyssey or Captain Queeg or those wonderful folks about whom Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote. We aren't in the dust bowl or the depression or the Long March. But getting from Minneapolis to Indianapolis is still a challenge. My advice: Don't take the Megabus. Or if you do, preparation is the key, and that includes adopting the right mind-set.

First, the good things about Megabus:

It's cheap.
It's easy to book reservations.
It's very inexpensive.
It's fairly quick -- not quicker than flying of course, but not much slower than driving.
It's less expensive than any conventional alternative (hitchhiking might be cheaper but too risky and walking or riding a bicycle too slow).
It's pretty cheap.
The drivers were nice. (One driver's choice of radio stations differed significantly from my own, which was only a problem for us because we happened to be sitting in the front row, directly behind the driver).

But...

The schedules may be just an approximation or an average. By the time we reached our destination (admittedly a long trip), we were an hour late. Given the performance of airlines and railroads, that ain't bad. It ain't good, either, so it belongs on the minus side of the ledger.
No cancellations, no refunds, and they mean it.
No air conditioning. (On one bus, the driver announced that the AC wasn't working very well. He explained by saying "It's an old bus.")
No stations. Changing buses in Chicago, passengers stand outside Union Station. It was a beautiful day. I wouldn't want to be stuck there in a thunderstorm or snowstorm. Of course, not having stations is a very good way to keep costs down, and low cost is precisely the appeal of Megabus service. Just be prepared to stand outside in any weather.

Overall: Very good for short hauls (for example: Minneapolis to Madison; Madison to Chicago; Indy to Cincy). Not great for long hauls.

Here's a poem by Franz Wright that features bus travel. The last line "I don't have to be anywhere" could become the marketing slogan for Megabus.

Alcohol
Franz Wright
You do look a little ill.

But we can do something about that, now.

Can’t we.

The fact is you’re a shocking wreck.

Do you hear me.

You aren’t all alone.

And you could use some help today, packing in the
dark, boarding buses north, putting the seat back and
grinning with terror flowing over your legs through
your fingers and hair . . .

I was always waiting, always here.

Know anyone else who can say that.

My advice to you is think of her for what she is:
one more name cut in the scar of your tongue.

What was it you said, “To rather be harmed than
harm, is not abject.”

Please.

Can we be leaving now.

We like bus trips, remember. Together

we could watch these winter fields slip past, and
never care again,

think of it.

I don’t have to be anywhere.

In the Garden and on the Megabus

2008-08-13T11:38:00.008-05:00

We have begun to harvest a few tomatoes and peppers and herbs from our excruciatingly modest garden. I would enjoy having a big, bountiful garden, but my skills, I fear, are not equal to the task. This poem captures my hesitancy perfectly:

The Definition of Gardening
by James Tate

Jim just loves to garden, yes he does.
He likes nothing better than to put on
his little overalls and his straw hat.
He says, "Let's go get those tools, Jim."
But then doubt begins to set in.
He says, "What is a garden, anyway?"
And thoughts about a "modernistic" garden
begin to trouble him, eat away at his resolve.
He stands in the driveway a long time.
"Horticulture is a groping in the dark
into the obscure and unfamiliar,
kneeling before a disinterested secret,
slapping it, punching it like a Chinese puzzle,
birdbrained, babbling gibberish, dig and
destroy, pull out and apply salt,
hoe and spray, before it spreads, burn roots,
where not desired, with gloved hands, poisonous,
the self-sacrifice of it, the self-love,
into the interior, thunderclap, excruciating,
through the nose, the earsplitting necrology
of it, the withering, shriveling,
the handy hose holder and Persian insect powder
and smut fungi, the enemies of the iris,
wireworms are worse than their parents,
there is no way out, flowers as big as heads,
pock-marked, disfigured, blinking insolently
at me, the me who so loves to garden
because it prevents the heaving of the ground
and the untimely death of porch furniture,
and dark, murky days in a large city
and the dream home under a permanent storm
is also a factor to keep in mind."

James Tate, "The Definition of Gardening" from Shroud of the Gnome. Copyright © 1997 by James Tate.

Eldest son and I will be on the road this weekend, adding to our ballpark life lists. We'll be in Cincinnati to see the Reds play the Cardinals. A pretty meaningless game for the home team, but the Cards are still in it, so that should be fun.

We are taking the Megabus, which is cheap and doesn't take much more time than driving. It could be horrible or pleasant or somewhere in between. We'll let you know. This blog will most likely be silent until we get back home next week.

Vagaries

2008-08-11T10:52:00.009-05:00

Little Nicky Punto
after his third
strikeout Sunday in
Kansas City

A few days ago, I wrote about how Nick Punto has improved this year. He's no longer the worst hitter in the league, as he was in 2007. That distinction now belongs to Tony Pena, Jr. of the Kansas City Royals. A .148 batting average for a major leaguer? You can't even see the Mendoza line from there. Yesterday in Kansas City, Nick Punto had a terrible game, looking lost at the plate. And Tony Pena, Jr.? He came off the bench to deliver two key hits in the Royals' extra-inning victory over the pathetic-looking Twins.

You just never know.

The Twins certainly don't seem to enjoy being in first place because every time they climb into first, they very quickly fall back again.

Sunday indecison (more or less)

2008-08-10T10:20:00.021-05:00

A beautiful day in the upper midwest. How to spend it?

Nominations:

In the basement clay studio, mixing some colored slips to use on a new batch of slab trays and vases.
The weather is just too nice to be in the basement. I'll hang the laundry out to dry in the sun and breeze.

In the yard, planting some more grass in that big bare spot where the stately spruces once stood.
Did that yesterday. Gotta take it easy today.

Watching the Olympics on TV.
The opening ceremony was certainly impressive, but....nah.

Watching an amateur baseball game in which eldest son is a pitcher.
That would work except I don't have a car or a bike today (long story).

Watching the Twins play the Royals on TV.
Yeah, maybe. But Bert Blyleven shouldn't be an announcer "at the major league level."

Finalizing a blog entry about a couple of odd grants from the Department of the Interior.
Yes! With footnotes!

These two grant announcements appeared recently on Grants.gov. I’m sure the good folks at the Department of the Interior think I’m picking on them. (Yeah, like they read this blog.) I may well be, but that’s only because these projects raise so many questions. Plus I’m bored.* And cranky.**

DOI
Department of the Interior
Bureau of Land Management
Wyoming Honor Farm Wild Horse Care & Training Agreement
Modification 1

The only other honor farm I’d heard of was on the flanks of the Mauna Loa volcano on the Big Island. The Kulani Honor Camp was for inmates who’d earned their way into this minimum security facility by behaving themselves in one of the other Hawai’i prisons. Inmates at Kulani spent their days raising crops and making things out of the rare native koa wood. I still prize my beautiful large koa bowl made by some anonymous but talented soul at Kulani. ***

The honor farm referenced in the DOI grant announcement is probably not a prison. “Wild Horse care” is an oxymoron. If they have to be cared for by humans, they aren’t wild any more. The announcement also refers to training, but it’s not clear whether the training is for people to learn how to take care of wild horses, or for the horses themselves. Training regular horses how to be wild? Training wild horses how to be even wilder? Training wild horses how to be less wild?

I guess I’m just having trouble understanding what’s so unique about wild horses that they are entitled to some special care. Aren’t they an invasive species, having been introduced to this continent by Europeans?**** Aren’t we trying to rid ourselves of invasive species?

Why, yes, we are.

DOI
Department of the Interior
Bureau of Land Management
Noxious & Invasive Plant Control in Sheridan County, WY
Modification 2

Interesting tidbit: A road in Sheridan County is named Wild Horse Road. I wonder what entitles one county to get federal help to control weeds when most counties (even those where weeds might actually be a problem for local famers or ranchers or parks or natural areas or wildlife habitat or my front yard) are on their own. Earmarks?

* Boredom may be the worst motive for writing, but I’ll bet that many a famous poem or novel sprang from such humble roots.

** It says so right in my Blogger ™ profile.

*** The camp is now known as the Kulani Correctional Facility and houses sex offenders.

**** One source says that an equine ancestor did roam North America but went extinct eons ago. Horses didn’t come back to the continent until Spanish explorers brought them along in the 16th century. These were, of course, entirely domesticated animals.

I love footnotes. And the Twins' game is only an inning old!

R. Brautigan, E. Webster, and S. Stover

2008-08-06T09:24:00.018-05:00

Here are three little shards of poems from the book "The Edna Webster Collection of Undiscovered Writings" [Houghton-Mifflin 1999]. Though the book was published posthumously, it contains Brautigan's earliest work, which he had given to a friend (Edna) in Washington when he was about 20 years old, just before heading off to San Francisco.

--------

perhaps

boy!
love
is something.
it
is like,
perhaps,
a piece
of apple pie.

----------
Nature Lover, or Something

I am
not particular.

I like whatever
the sky happens
to be doing at the time.

-----------
profound saying 4

People who
live in glass
houses
have Chihuahuas
instead of
children.

-----

That last one reminds me of Smokey Stover, a cartoon strip my parents liked. One of Smokey's trademarks was taking aphorisms or phrases and making them slightly nonsensical. These often appeared in framed needlepoint on the wall of his house. One was "People who live in glass houses should foo in the barn." Another: "Notary Sojac." Smokey drove a fire truck. The license plate on the truck sometimes read "FOO E 2 U." My parents thought that was hilarious, which may explain some things.

The Redemption of Little Nicky Punto

2008-08-05T11:48:00.009-05:00

Nick Punto hit a homer last night – his 2nd this year – though the Twins later gave the game away. If Bat-Girl were still writing her hilarious blog, she would have had the tiny super hero flying around the bases in a cape. Bat-Girl loved Little Nicky Punto.

I wrote about Punto last year, calling him the worst 3rd baseman in the league and wondering why Mr. Gardenhire gave Mr. Punto so much playing time. This year, Punto hasn’t played much at third, but has gotten lots of playing time at second base and short stop, especially after Alexi Casilla went down with a finger injury.

Has Punto, long known as a good defender but very poor batter, improved this year? Well, yes, it appears so. I looked at a few stats that purport to measure offense and, compared to the Punto of 2007, Little Nicky has stepped up his game. I looked at the two Puntos (07 and 08) and eight other American League middle infielders. I chose these because I didn’t want to spend the time looking at every single AL player who’s seen regular duty at second base or shortstop this year. That’s too much work and I think the point can be made with just a sampling.

The eight other players are:
Pedroia (Bosox)
Lugo (Bosox)
Cabrera (Chisox)
Ramirez (Chisox)
Carroll (Cleve)
Peralta (Cleve)
T. Pena, Jr. (KC)
Grudz (KC)

Batting average: Punto is batting .285 so far, which ranks him 4th in this group. The ’07 Punto would be 9th. (Pedroia is hitting .317).

Slugging %: Punto’s is .424, also placing him 4th in this group. Last year’s version would rank 9th.

OPS+: Punto’s tied for 2nd in this group at 107 (with Peralta and Ramirez), behind Pedroia at 112. Last year’s OPS+ would put Punto 9th.

Looking at just these few indicators, I’d say Punto has gone from a dismal offensive force to an acceptable one. And the homers? Well, he’s already hit twice as many as he hit in 2007!

Joe Posnanski has written about how bad Tony Pena, Jr. (known around Kansas City as TPJ) is for the Royals. I looked at these ten players, and in every category that matters, the ’07 Punto is ninth and Pena is tenth. TPJ is the only one on this list with an OPS+ on the negative side of zero.

But TPJ can pitch!

First place

2008-08-04T09:20:00.006-05:00

My son and I were at the Dome Sunday to watch the Twins at last climb precariously into first place. I've written about this before -- how tenuous the hold on first can be. The glow may last a day or a week or until the end of September. Let's enjoy it.

Welcome back, Francisco. So long, Livan.

Two short poems

2008-08-01T19:38:00.009-05:00

In honor of Minnesota's sesquicentennial and the 150th post (!) on this here blog, here are two short poems.

In an authentic drawl

“I should have been a country record producer,” he said

between puffs on his cigarette. It was a familiar

lament, and I responded as I usually do.

“Why is that, Dad?”

“Because I know that when you resort to strings,

you’re either desperate or dead.”

I nodded.

----

Kabuki Circus

The circus came and went.

A one-night stand in a nondescript town.

The advance publicity consisted entirely of

posters nailed to telephone poles.

The trucks arrived in the morning,

the tent went up in the afternoon,

and by midnight the lot was empty.

---

I recently subscribed to The Lilliput Review, a poetry journal produced only in print (quaint) and featuring poems no longer than ten lines. These two poems meet that simple criterion, though I'm reluctant to submit them. Never done that before.

Adventures in the Big City

2008-07-31T10:52:00.006-05:00

We got a late start because of my wife’s work-related obligation, which was supposed to have included dinner, but the food didn’t come.

On the way out of town, there was a slow train blocking the crossing so we had to take a little detour. That’s one disadvantage of living in a small town – a single long train can cut the town in half like a giant ax.

The place we normally park near the Dome was full, and the alternate place was, too, so we ended up in a big parking ramp a few blocks from the Dome. At least it was cheap.

The plaza outside the Dome was packed – student night, dollar-a-dog night, and a battle for first place in the division had brought the crowds out. That’s OK. Big crowds are exciting and can pump up the home team, eh? Before we even got to our seats, Livan “El Principe” Hernandez had given up a solo home run to Carlos Quentin. A sense of foreboding was building.

A few rows from us, the obligatory drunken, foul-mouthed fan was in full throat and had lost all entertainment value by the third inning. He finally got escorted out in about the seventh inning.

The fan right behind us regaled everyone within earshot with her opinions of A.J. Peirzinski’s new hairdo. She didn’t like it.

Livan was relieved by Boof and Boof pitched well until he was visited on the mound by the pitching coach. The next batter hit a two-out, bases-clearing double. I may just be imagining it, but that sequence seems to happen a lot. Pitcher gets in jam, Anderson has brief talk with pitcher, pitcher promptly gives up big hit or walk. Somebody should be analyzing this. We need a new stat called RAPCV – Results After Pitching Coach Visit. So Boof’s trade value went from ‘not much’ to ‘near nothing’ in about five minutes.

The Twins did make a few nice plays. And we got to see Bobby Jenks pitch with a seven run lead. How often has that happened?

We didn’t eat or drink anything at the Dome because it was too crowded to stand in line at the concession stands and everything is so damned expensive anyway. Even with the losing and the loudmouths and the hunger, the game was still kind of fun. Almost caught a foul ball.

The parking ramp was jammed. Long lines of people at the pay station, longer lines of cars snaking up all six levels. We decided not to waste time or gas sitting around in a parking ramp, so we went next door to get a bite to eat and wait for the traffic to clear. The bar wasn’t too crowded and the waitress took our order right away and they were selling tap beer two-for-one with our Twins ticket stub. But the kitchen was closed so all they could offer my starving wife was a bowl of pretzels. The waitress seemed to disappear for the longest time, and when she returned she said that they were out of the beer we’d ordered. OK, so we are still thirsty but we aren’t in a huge hurry. The substitute beer took forever to arrive and it was served in tiny plastic cups. Very classy. Even at two for one, it was no bargain.

A big section of the highway going south out of downtown was closed, so our route home included a leisurely tour through the streets of south Minneapolis, where my wife grew up. We decided to take Portland all they way down to 66th, then take 66th west to the freeway. At the intersection of Portland and 66th, we encountered a brand-new roundabout, still under construction. I hate roundabouts. But by then it was late and there wasn’t any traffic, so no big deal. I would certainly avoid that intersection during rush hour, though.

Glad to be home.

Six things (or, nostalgia is curable)

2008-07-29T13:05:00.008-05:00

Three cool things I didn’t have as a kid:

Postage stamps. OK, we had stamps. I’m not THAT old. But the kind you peel and stick instead of lick and stick? Those are a brilliant innovation.

Window clings. The elegantly simple use of static electricity instead of messy adhesives. Nice. These came in quite handy when daughter changed college affiliations three times in less than three years (accepted at Simmons, then decided at the last minute to go to the U of M, then transferred to Occidental* after her freshman year.) Also handy when selling a car.

Refrigerator containers. My mom had a world-class collection of Tupperware. She had to go to these lame-ass parties to get it. And it was expensive. But if you had leftovers (and for my mother, leftovers were treated like sacraments), you had Tupperware. It was apparently the only game in town. Now, the plethora of cheap plastic containers is amazing. Every shape, size, color. We are truly blessed.

Three not so cool things I didn’t have as a kid:

Roundabouts. Sometimes called traffic circles, these suddenly seem to be the darlings of traffic engineers. I have driven on roundabouts in the eastern US and in Europe, so I know they’ve been in use for a very long time, but here in the great middle west, the plains states, where we have bad winters and worse drivers, roundabouts just don’t work very well. Traffic experts like them because they enable a more or less continuous flow of traffic, but I think that’s exactly the problem. At least when cars stop at a four-way stop, they can’t bang into other cars while they are stopped.

Check engine lights. There are two ways to interpret the signal from a check engine light. 1. “EMERGENCY! STOP RIGHT NOW AND CALL A TOW TRUCK! ONE MORE MILE AND I BLOW UP!” or 2. “Hey, buddy, how’s it going? Y’know, there might be some little issue with your car. Maybe the catalytic converter only has, like, 3,500 miles left? Or it could be somebody didn’t screw the gas cap in tightly enough. I don’t know. You might want to get that checked out sometime. Or not.” The worst kind is the intermittent kind. PANIC! Don’t worry. HELP! Never mind. OH MY GOD! It’s okay, really.

Free shipping. Who are they kidding? We all pay for shipping.

* On the Occidental College bookstore web site, the window cling that says simply "Occidental College" in block letters is described as a "rear window strip." Does it not work on the side windows? I know it's not a good idea to put it on the front window. It could be distracting, especially if the driver is approaching a roundabout with the check engine light on.

How to grow dwarf peppers

2008-07-27T09:40:00.007-05:00

Buy regular pepper plant sprouts early in the spring.
Green, yellow, red.

Buy a bunch of tomato plants, too.
Roma, cherry, Big Boy.

Plant the pepper plants very close to the tomato plants.
A few inches, a foot at most.

Wait.

The tomato plants will grow large and bushy.
They will hog the light, forcing the pepper plants to cower and cringe.
The resulting peppers will be undernourished, puny, shrunken.

We haven't picked any yet, so we don't know if they will be all the sweeter for having suffered so, or bitter. But they are kind of cute.

---

Here is one of Brautigan's earliest published poems, from the series printed on seed packets and bound together as "Please Plant This Book."

Shasta Daisy
I pray that in thirty-two years
passing that flowers and vegetables
will water the Twenty-First Cent-
ury with their voices telling that
they were once a book turned by
loving hands into life.

Kiko!

2008-07-25T20:25:00.013-05:00

Here's a video of Brazilian percussionist Kiko Freitas playing on a song called "Vento Bravo" with the group Nosso Trio. Kiko's solo begins at about the 5:30 mark. Be patient -- it's worth it.

Enjoy!

I especially like how he changes his left hand grip seamlessly. The glasses remind me of Joe Morello.

Something Else That's Been Bugging Me

2008-07-25T09:57:00.006-05:00

New link on the right side: Issa's Untidy Hut, which is a sister blog of the Lilliput Review. I added it mostly because its proprietor recently posted a short clip of a movie featuring Richard Brautigan and two of my other favorite writers: Jim Harrison and Tom McGuane. At one time, these guys were the backbone of the Montana literary Mafia. Check it out.

A new video from Drummers World will be posted here this weekend. A fantastic Latin/Fusion drum solo from a young man in Brazil who reminds me of Joe Morello. I just gotta get to the right computer to make the 'embed video' feature work.

The Twins start a three-game series in Cleveland tonight at the regressively-named Progressive Field. Jacobs Field was a nice name and lent itself to a clever diminutive form: "The Jake." What kind of nickname can be fashioned from Progressive Field? "The Prof?" "The Pro?" Don't bother.

If you happen to be in or around Northfield on election day this November, don't forget to stop by a polling place (there are many to choose from) and write in Brendon Etter's name for mayor. His write-in campaign is off to a rousing start, with dozens of slogans, a lawsuit or two, intriguing proposals, and preemptive apologies. Local politics have been quite entertaining in recent years, but not in a good way. Etter's candidacy changes that.

To Drill or Not to Drill: What Would Brautigan Say?

2008-07-23T08:57:00.008-05:00

So drill already.

Why postpone the inevitable?

If we drill for oil as much as we can possibly drill in as many places as we can think of, there are really only two scenarios.

1. We will quickly exhaust the earth’s supply of oil and then be forced to scramble to find other sources of energy (or find ways to survive without).

2. We will discover that there is an almost limitless supply of oil and we needn’t worry quite so much about it.

The second is highly unlikely, but what’s the problem? Suck the planet dry. It will still take a generation or three to determine with any certainty what massive exploration and drilling have actually done to the supply of oil. If our successors are smart (not a given, but not a bad bet), they will have figured out some options that are safer, cleaner, and more fun.

I believe that Rep. Michelle Bachman is almost certainly insane, living in some kind of fantasy world. But I agree with her on aggressive oil exploration. She’s wrong about the effect on gas prices – more domestic production won’t bring prices down. But why not drill now instead of fighting about it for decades? And for every barrel of crude extracted from the earth, the oil company should pay $50.00 into an alternative energy development fund run by a consortium of prestigious universities. Like the Manhattan Project.

Call it the Cheney-Gore Center for Energy Independence. Hell, put it in Texas, if that would buy some Republican votes.

Yeah, there are some environmental concerns, what with pipelines and tankers and refineries and such. But that’s why we have the EPA, eh?

---------

For some perspective on time and nature, here’s a verse from Richard Brautigan. (First published in “Lay the Marble Tea” 1959)

Yes, the Fish Music
A trout-colored wind blows
through my eyes, through my fingers,
and I remember how the trout
used to hide from the dinosaurs
when they came to drink at the river.
The trout hid in subways, castles
and automobiles. They waited patiently
for the dinosaurs to go away.

---

NOTE: The illustration at the top of this post is of permafrost/tundra in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Though the ground is frozen to a depth of several feet to several hundred feet, the surface does respond to temperature changes. The thin polygonal plates develop over some years of freezing and thawing. The colors and patterns are beautiful.

The Pots of June

2008-07-19T11:30:00.019-05:00

Here are a few pieces -- three of about fifteen -- that came out of the kiln last month. These are experiments, as nearly all of my stuff is. Playing around with colored slips, engobes, and underglazes.

Mostly the results were good. Some will be available for sale later this summer at the Northfield Arts Guild shop.

Some may become wedding gifts (our oldest son has reached the age when many of his friends are getting married, which naturally makes us feel a little old).

Some may end up as Christmas gifts, especially since older sister (a master organizer, which is a good thing) has decided that gifts in this year's annual family exchange will be hand-made.

A bargain at any price!

[NOTE: It would be nice if these pictures lined up neatly on the left and the text flowed neatly on the right. Alas, I give up trying get Blogger to do what I want it to do.]

[NOTE: If you click on these pictures, they get freakishly large.]

Brautigan's friend's garden

2008-07-15T11:25:00.005-05:00

Our comically tiny vegetable garden has produced a few tomatoes and a puny pepper, some weeks away from maturity. It is such a pitiful sight, I'm embarassed to be seen watering it. Perhaps we'll do better next year, having learned a little (he said, with the unjustified optimism of Jim Leyland or Trey Hilleman).

Here's a Brautigan verse that seems appropriate.

From "Rommel Drives on Deep Into Egypt:"

My Concern for Your Tomato Plants
I stare at your tomato plants.
You're not, I'm not pleased with the way
they are growing.
I try to think of ways to help them.
I study them. What do I know about tomatoes?
"Perhaps some nitrate," I suggest.
But I don’t know anything and now I've taken
to gossiping about them. I'm as shameless
as their lack of growing.

Depth Chart: The ghost of Michael Cuddyer

2008-07-14T13:21:00.010-05:00

Michael Cuddyer tells Denard Span to
get back in the dugout.
And stay there.

Checked the official Twins site today looking for trade rumors, although the official site is the last place I'd really expect to find such rumors.

I'm thinking that Boof's days as a Twin should be numbered, but I don't think any other club would jump at the chance to acquire Mr. Bonser.

Just bouncing more or less randomly around the Twins site, I looked at the depth chart. Michael Cuddyer isn't listed anywhere. Not in right field (his regular starting position), not as a backup third- or first-baseman. And not on the disabled list. Michael, where are you? Who'd we get for Michael? What did Micheal do to anger the manager or the front office?

His omission from the on-line depth chart is obviously inadvertent, but that got me to thinking -- Cuddyer might be very good trade bait. Mr. Span has certainly impressed since being called up to replace the injured Cuddyer. Kubel and Young could split time in left; Gomez is pretty solid (at least defensively) in center; Span looks good in right. Monroe is a serviceable veteran backup.

So, what could we get for Cuddyer?

Don't get me wrong, I like the guy, and I'm not saying he should be traded. It's just fun to speculate, especially during the all-star break. Cuddyer for Beltre, straight up?

Acting Up

2008-07-12T12:24:00.009-05:00

One of my college teachers -- Dr. Kinzer, I think -- was a fan of Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne, a famed acting couple from the golden age of Broadway. I remember Dr. Kinzer quoting Lunt on the secret to great stage acting: "Speak loudly and try not to bump into things." Sir Lawrence Olivier said once that he learned acting from Lunt. I discovered today that Lunt and Fontanne built a lavish estate near Milwaukee and the house, called Ten Chimneys, is now open to tourists. Check it out here.

On Joe Posnanski's amazing blog, there is a rollicking debate about who's the better actor -- Tom Cruise or Kevin Costner. Of course, the great thing about that debate is that both of these guys have been in some truly bad movies and in some classics. Bull Durham is still one of my favorites.

The Show Must Go On (and On)

2008-07-09T08:22:00.006-05:00

The blogging frequency is down a little bit here at TFIM because the Northfield Arts Guild production of "Holes" is in the final week of rehearsal (the dreaded "tech week.") Ordinarily, the Arts Guild theatre schedule would not have any appreciable effect on this here blog, but I'm in the show. Eight performances in two weeks plus tonight's final dress rehearsal. Plus all the wild cast parties. Plus this day job that kind of gets in the way.

If you are in or around Northfield between July 10 and July 20, come see "Holes." It's funny, touching, inspiring, fast-paced, and inexpensive.

Seven and a half songs

2008-07-05T15:32:00.024-05:00

On June 17, Penelopedia tagged me with a ‘meme’ and I didn't know it until yesterday. And I didn't know until today what this even means. Tagged? Meme? Hey, this doesn't hurt a bit! I don't mind being tagged with a meme, especially if it has to do with music and bragging. So I'm supposed to blog about seven songs I'm listening to. I guess the vast legion of readers will jump right over to iTunes and buy these songs, eh?

1. All The Time In The World by The Subdudes from the CD Primitive Streak (High Street Records 1996). An eclectic group with New Orleans roots.

2. High Water by Bob Dylan from Love & Theft.

3. Too Soon To Tell by The Subdudes from Primitive Streak. Bonnie Raitt appears on slide guitar and backing vocal. Nice.

4. March of the Lost Children by Joe Zawinul & The WDR Big Band on the CD Brown Street (2007 Heads Up Records), featuring the justly famous Alex Acuña on percussion. This tune is a good bridge to the next one because it has kind of a 60's jazz feel to it.

5. Cool Blues by Jimmy Smith from the CD of the same name (Blue Note 1958; 2001 re-issue). Lou Donaldson on sax, Art Blakey on drums. I've written before about seeing Blakey and Donaldson play. This record is quintessential Jimmy Smith.

6a. Procession by Joe Zawinul from Brown Street. Fine use of a barking dog.

6b. The Clothesline Saga by The Roches on A Nod to Bob tribute CD (Red House Records). This is a little-known Dylan song, done with great mystery and humor by The Roches.

7. Interesting by Mavis Staples from Time Waits for No One. Paisley Park Studios (year?). Prince himself, who produced the album, plays drums on this number.

Jumper Cables

2008-07-03T08:57:00.009-05:00

It's odd to think of jumper cables on a hot July day in Minnesota. The cables lie neglected in the trunk or hang ignored in the garage. But yesterday I got a call from my daughter in California. She and her friend wanted some fatherly advice on jumper cables. I was surprised to learn that anyone in southern California owned jumper cables, but there they were in Los Angeles, trying to jump-start her friend's car. It seems her friend's sister had borrowed the car and left the lights on all night. Even in California, that will drain the battery. So they came up with a pair of jumper cables, as out of place as an icebreaker in the Caribbean, and had to call dad back in Minnesota. Glad to help out.

It reminded me of a Brautigan poem. This Brautigan poem.

Herman Melville in Dreams, Moby Dick in Reality

In reality Moby Dick
was a Christ-like goldfish
that swam through the aquarium
saving the souls of snails, and Captain Ahab
was a religious Siamese cat
that helped old ladies
start their automobiles.

(from Lay the Marble Tea, 1959)

Overreach

2008-07-01T08:01:00.002-05:00

Saw on the TV news that a young man had constructed what was described as a "homemade firecracker," which he then blew up in his yard. The thing was so powerful that it blew his hand off. The TV reporter said that local authorities had charged him with possession of an explosive device and some other minor offense.

It’s pretty clear that the young man broke some laws. It’s also pretty clear that the natural and very unpleasant consequences are far greater than any consequences that might ensue from prosecution. What exactly is the point of bringing these charges? We’re going to teach him a lesson?* We’re going to teach others a lesson?** I’m sorry, Mr. Prosecutor, but I’m pretty sure whatever lessons are to be learned have already been learned. This gentleman is supposed to say, “Gee, now that I’m facing a stiff fine and some court costs, I guess maybe blowing my own hand off was a mistake. I hadn’t realized that before.” Sometimes, the power of the state is trivial compared to the powers of fate. Prosecuting this young man seems just a little pointless and redundant.*** If it had been his neighbor’s person or property he’d blown up, then by all means slap him in irons and haul him to the hoosegow. Roll out the heavy artillery of the criminal justice system because you’d have a worthy target in the offender and an aggrieved victim for whom the system may be able to provide some redress.

And as for deterring others, I think that’s just as much of a stretch. Most people who are predisposed to such recklessness and stupidity have convinced themselves that the bad stuff won’t happen to them (“Well, when I play with explosives, I’m way smarter than that dude who blew his hand off.”)

* This is the theory of specific deterrence, which holds that swift and certain punishment is more effective than any punishment meted out inconsistently or long after the offense.
** This is the theory of general deterrence, which has been shown to be pretty weak and ineffectual, especially in Western cultures.
*** I was going to say that it’s like rubbing salt in the wound.

Two drakes

2008-06-27T12:29:00.004-05:00

Two mallard drakes have built a little nest in a planter in front of the building where I work. The two drakes are carefully tending the nest and sitting on the eggs. Someone with a better view than mine says that the daddies are taking turns and that the mommy has never been seen. She apparently abandoned the nest after laying the eggs.

Somebody tell Katherine Kersten about the gay drakes in Rice County! A scandal right here on government property in the rural heartland! Can Katherine and the Archbishop save us?!

Baseball is a funny game, etc.

2008-06-24T19:44:00.014-05:00

Man, I don't like these west-coast road trips. The Twins in San Diego, me in Minnesota. I can never stay awake for the whole game. At least this trip is short.

Sunday, we watched the Twins win their sixth game in a row. That's pretty cool by itself, but there were a few other unique things about that game worth noting. In the first inning, Senor Hernandez (El Principe) set the D-Backs down 1-2-3. All three outs were scored 4-3 (groundouts to the 2nd baseman). I guess that's somewhat unusual. It was also a good sign. I had just read in the GameDay program that Hernandez wins when he induces ground balls. Good start against your old mates, Livan!

The redundancy continued:

In the D-Backs' 2nd inning, Conor Jackson singled (1b); Chad Tracy flew out to left field (F7);Mark Reynolds singled (1b), and Chris Young struck out looking on three pitches (backward K).

In the D-Backs' 4th inning, Jackson singled (1b); Tracy flew out to left field (F7); Reynolds singled (1b), and Young struck out looking on three pitches (backward K).

That was eerie.

In the 6th (I think it was the sixth -- my scorecard has some gaps in it after the fifth inning), the D-Backs had runners on first and second. The batter whiffed on a bunt attempt and Mauer threw to 2nd and picked off the runner. The throw was so quick and accurate that everyone, especially the D-Backs' runner, was shocked. That was fun to watch.

And the D-Backs showed a bit of hubris (or stupidity) by having their regular first baseman play left field without any preparation for the Dome's notorious roof (or was it the lights?). He lost a routine fly that lead to the Twins' big inning. So that was fun in a perverse way (as in: This place really stinks as a baseball park but sometime that works in our favor).

And finally, George Carlin's famous bit about football and baseball was one of my favorites. I add my voice to those who say "You done good, George."

I'll Grant You That (Part IV)

2008-06-20T10:38:00.005-05:00

This announcement, reproduced verbatim, appeared recently on grants.gov:

HHS
Department of Health and Human Services
National Institutes of Health
Integrative Systems Biology Approaches to Auditory Hair Cell Regeneration (R21)
Grant

Auditory hair cell regeneration? Oh, the possibilities…

Scream treatment: The ideal job for a retired drill instructor. The DI rants, nose against the bald spot. “HEY, you sissy follicles. I’m talking to YOU! Get your lazy asses in GEAR! I want to see some HAIR and I want to see it NOW! YOU GOT THAT?” And so forth.

Music therapy: The bald person is put in a small, dark room, dozens of tiny speakers arrayed around his head. Vivaldi and Rachmaninoff alternate with Thin Lizzy and Motorhead. Perhaps the soundtrack from “Hair.”

Natural remedies: Through ear buds (how appropriate), the patient is given frequent doses of selected sounds from nature, suggesting fecundity and growth. Cricket chirps, water flowing over rocks, spring peepers, a gentle rainfall, the mating calls of various bird species, a chimpanzee in heat.

Science fiction placebo: The balding patient is placed in a room lined floor to ceiling with sophisticated-looking, futuristic gadgets tended by serious-looking men and women in lab coats of shiny black and silver. He is told that these machines positively will make his hair grow back if he concentrates on the sounds. The machines have names like Follicular Stimulation Aggregator, Double Intensity Scalp Hydrotron, Shaft Dysfunctionometer. They whir, they beep, they oscillate. He is convinced beyond doubt that the sounds he hears are the sounds of his own hair growing.

But the grant is for “integrative systems,” so the potential grantee would have to figure out a way to combine these.

So...

The machines are tended not by faux scientists, but by chimps in heat, supervised by a drill instructor in a lab coat. And through the room a stream runs and birds flutter, with the combined sounds of all these things (plus Vivaldi), delivered straight to the patient like an auditory stew.

I am so going to apply for this grant!

Televised Golf

2008-06-18T14:31:00.013-05:00

Watching the third round of the US Open on Sunday, I thought of one of my college professors. I forget the exact title of the course, but it was about media and culture. We read Marshall McLuhan and some other stuff. The professor (I wish I could remember his name) was making predictions about what media might look like in the coming years. (This was way back in 1968.) He said, among other things, that a helmet-like piece of headgear would be developed -- electrodes communicating directly with the brain -- that could transmit not just images and sounds, but smells and physical sensations, creating a virtual reality. He was especially intrigued by the pornographic implications, but also mentioned stuff like military training.

He repeatedly asserted that the appetite for television was insatiable. To illustrate his point, he predicted boldly that someday, people would actually watch entire golf tournaments on television. Golf!

Basketball is the perfect TV sport, he said, because the action is continuous and there’s lots of scoring so viewers won’t be bored. And it’s played in a small indoor space so it makes no unusual demands on TV technology.

Football is good on TV, too, he said, because it’s pretty easy to follow and the physical stuff (big guys banging into each other) is easy to capture on camera.

Baseball is slow – lots of long stretches between action – and much of what’s important in baseball is small (pitch location, for example) and hard to capture on TV (remember, we’re talking 1968 here, when cameras were clumsy and there was no such thing as freeze-frame or instant replay or super slo-mo or the extreme closeup). If people will watch baseball on TV (and they did in 1968), they’ll watch anything. Even bowling. Even…more golf!*

He’d shake his head and laugh at the absurd truth of it.

And I pretty much agreed with the professor for the last 40 years. Televised golf is just a snooze.Until Sunday, that is. Here I was, watching golf on TV. It was what the late Jim McKay called hyperbolically “the human drama of athletic competition.” On a golf course?

Yes.

* Golf was televised before 1968, of course, but it wasn’t until 1977 that the third and fourth rounds of a PGA tour event were televised in their entirety. The professor was talking about the likelihood of people watching more than the last few holes of the final round. I do not believe even he could have anticipated The Golf Channel.

Baseball career (abbrev.)

2008-06-13T20:46:00.004-05:00

Scout: Maybe we should take a look at this kid. (points to name on list)

Assistant GM: Why?

Scout: His uncle was a pretty good catcher – played some college ball with my brother.

Assistant GM: That ain’t much of a recommendation.

Scout: Yeah, but his uncle – I kind of promised him I'd put in a good word for the kid.

Assistant GM: Ok, you did. Who else you got on your list?

Scout: Hey, at least let me run down the basics. You got five minutes?

Assistant GM: (shrugs and sighs) OK, go.

Scout: Thanks. Ummm…Third base, shortstop – not a good enough arm. Second base - not enough range. First base - too short. Left field, center field – maybe, but not a lot of speed. Right field – he played some there in high school. Catcher – we could put him there in the developmental league and see what happens.

Assistant GM: You forgot hitting. Can he hit?

Scout: Not really.

Assistant GM: (pause) Explain to me again why we are talking at all about drafting this kid.

Scout: His uncle. Pretty good catcher.

Revised short post (to make it less short)

2008-06-12T14:41:00.002-05:00

Sour cream.
Sour grapes.
Whiskey sour.
Sour mood.
Sour milk.

Gentle breeze.
Gentle touch.
Gentle Ben.
Gentle on my mind.

Against the grain.
Against all odds.
Against the wall.

Hands up.
Time's up.

Stage CV

2008-06-09T20:31:00.010-05:00

Some characters I’ve played (in no particular order):

Murray the cop in “The Odd Couple.” The New York accent was fun, but we weren’t allowed to actually smoke the cigars on stage. Phooey.

Bob Cratchit in “Scrooge!” Being poor and kind and stoic and forgiving was a stretch for me. Especially the ‘kind’ part.

Groucho Marx in “Flywheel, Shyster, and Flywheel.” Probably the most fun I’ve ever had on stage. The narrator was played by the esteemed and darkly comic Brendon Etter.

Captain Horster in “An Enemy of the People.” This explains my lifelong distaste for Ibsen.

Gooper in “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” During the midweek tune-up rehearsal, the entire cast decided to change just a few words in every line to get the others to laugh and lose the way. It was hilarious except to the director. Everyone (except, again, the director) thought Tennessee Williams should lighten up a little. And, you know, Brick really was a jerk (the character, not the actor).

Some guy (perhaps Charles Lomax) in “Major Barbara.” Probably the worst theatrical experience ever, which is why I’ve all but erased the character’s name from my memory.

Grandpa in “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.” This was made more enjoyable because we got to sing a couple of songs written just for this show by Marc Robinson, a brilliantly funny lyricist (masquerading by day as a professor of Russian). For these tunes, it was the world premier!Also played two dancing squirrel hand-puppets.

Bosco in “Donata’s Gift.” Playing the bad guy witch-hunter in an operetta based on an Italian folk story – how you gonna top that, eh? Another world musical premier, this time by Christine Kallman.

Joe in “The Shadow Box.” Joe (along with half the other characters) is dying and his wife and child don’t want to believe it. Lots of crying, but some nice lyrical speeches.

Marcus Lycus in “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum.” Thus my lifelong love of Phil Silvers.

Alex Loomis in “Take Her, She’s Mine.” I learned about Ouzo from this play. When it was made into a movie starring Jimmy Stewart, the plot was kind of the same, but the locale changed from New York and Greece to New York and Paris and Alex Loomis became some suave French dandy (un coquin?) instead of an earnest but adventurous college man.

Nicky Holroyd in "Bell Book and Candle." Another play made into a movie starring Jimmy Stewart. In the 1958 Hollywood version, Nicky Holroyd was played by Jack Lemmon. Also in that movie: Ernie Kovacs. Kovacs deserves a post of his own (check back often!).

Sound Man in “Visit to Small Planet.” This could be Gore Vidal’s least-biting satire. I’m surprised it isn’t produced more often. Perhaps it’s because the movie (an adaptation of the stage play which was an adaptation of a novel) starred Jerry Lewis. Makes it hard to take seriously.

Choir Director in “Our Town.” A true chestnut of the American stage.

Mortimer Brewster in “Arsenic and Old Lace.” Charming, cute, ditsy, elderly murderers. Funny! In the movie version, Mortimer was played by Cary Grant.

Mr. Finnigan in “The Loud Red Patrick.” In about 1953, this unremarkable play had a Broadway run of 93 shows, then slipped into deserved oblivion; that is until my junior high school drama coach inexplicably decided to revive it.

Ed Carmichael in “You Can’t Take it with You.” I could play the xylophone and run a small printing press using hand-set type, skills that proved of no value later in life.

They're kidding, right?

2008-06-02T12:06:00.013-05:00

Working and blogging -- for me, these are usually separate things.

I'll make an exception today.

Part of my job involves hiring. Part of that process is screening applications. I reviewed about 35 of those this morning. A few stood out, but not for the right reasons.

One applicant listed several very short previous jobs. The reason for leaving was the same for each: disputes about pay and hours. The same applicant listed as the only reference a personal friend named Grizzly. I imagine that whenever this person had a dispute with his or her employer (often, apparently), he or she would bring in ol' buddy Grizzly as (shall we say) an advocate. I will interview this applicant only if he or she promises to bring Grizzly.

Another applicant, in the space that asks for membership in relevant professional organizations, listed "Anytime Fitness." (Note: the job does not require any sort of physical fitness or stamina.)

Another person applied twice. That's no big deal, except that the applicant's past job experiences differed in the two applications.

Sometimes this job is too easy.

But my employer should get a little flak, too. The employment application form has such helpful directions as "please write legibly" and "be complete." I would love to see a form someday that says "please scrawl unintelligibly" or "please be cryptic and obfuscatory."

Brautigan projections

2008-05-30T14:14:00.014-05:00

It's been a few weeks since we posted anything by or about Richard Brautigan. I've been trying to find just the right poem or story of his to suit the season or my mood or some current event. But nothing seemed just right.

Until, that is, I heard on the radio a mention of Bill Ratican. Last week, Hibbing, MN held a big festival celebrating native son Bob Dylan and his music -- Dylan turned 67 in late May. Part of the event was a concert at Hibbing High School's famous auditorium. Minnesota Public Radio was giving away tickets and mentioned that the seats were next to the seat where the ghost sits. Bill Ratican (and his ghost, I guess) was my wife's great uncle, who was (among other things) a projectionist at the Hibbing movie house and a stagehand at the high school auditorium. His ghost is said to haunt the place and to prefer a particular seat in the house during rehearsals and performances.

Bill Ratican's ghost reminded me of this Brautigan poem, from "Rommel Drives on Deep into Egypt."

Mrs. Myrtle Tate, Movie Projectionist

Mrs. Myrtle Tate, movie projectionist
died Wednesday in San Francisco.
She was 66, retired.

We must remember again the absolute
excitement of the moon and think lyrically
about her death.

It is very important for our Twentieth Century
souls because she was "one of the few women
who worked as a movie projectionist."

Oh, honor this mothersisterbride
of magic lanterns with an endless waterfall of
visions.

Joe Zawinul

2008-05-27T08:04:00.016-05:00

In addition to a stack of partially-read books, I am confronted daily by a small pile of CDs that I want to listen to, supplemented by a list of recommendations from various music blogs like Old Blue Bus and Songs:Illinois. The CDs come from our friendly local libraries which, as a way to get some good songs, is even cheaper than i-Tunes.

One of the CDs is Joe Zawinul's 1997 two-disc set "World Tour." I like it a lot. Like many jazz fans, I first encountered Zawinul when he co-founded the group Weather Report, which some historians credit for inventing or at least popularizing jazz fusion. Their song "Birdland" was a hit.

Anyway, I got this CD from the library and, while listening to it, looked around on the Interweb for stuff about Joe Zawinul. To my surprise, I found out he had died last year. September 11, 2007. What? How come I didn't know this?

I'll just say I enjoy his music vey much. He was doing "world music" before it became a genre. Thank you, Joe.

Book stack

2008-05-23T13:05:00.029-05:00

The pile of I-really-ought-to-read-these books is getting precariously high and about to get higher. Saturday, local celeb Tom Swift will do a book signing at the St. Olaf book store. His biography "Chief Bender's Burden" is getting good reviews, so I'll probably buy one and add it to the stack.

I've bitten off chunks of these books in the last two months. Just can't seem to settle on one.

Dubliners, James Joyce
The Heart Can be Filled Anywhere on Earth: Minneota, Minnesota, Bill Holm
Steve Goodman: Facing the Music, Clay Eales
A couple of pottery books and couple of recent issues of "Studio Potter" magazine
The Minnesota Twins 2008 Yearbook, various anonymous writers (or maybe just one, whose anonymity is deserved)
The Minnesota Twins 2008 Media Guide and Record Book
The Minnesota Book of Days (and a Few Nights), Howard Mohr
Holes, Louis Sachar (the stage script version).

I hadn't realized how Minnecentric the list is until I wrote it down. That's OK.

Three of these were purchased at the Northfield Hospital Auxiliary annual book sale a few weeks ago. Some came as premiums with Twins season tickets. The Steve Goodman book was recommended by a commenter (I think it was the author, actually) on the wonderful music blog "Old Blue Bus."

A few words about that book:

Huge (it's the size of a Western Civ textbook)

Sluggish (it reads like a Western Civ textbook)

Interesting (which, according to Mohr's classic How to Talk Minnesotan, is a nice way to say "I didn't really like it, but somebody else might.")

Eales is a journalist by training and it shows. The book tries and fails to evoke the spirit of Goodman -- his impishness, wackiness, fear, courage, kindness. It describes these things, but in a clinical way. It is a dry, long, boring recitation of facts and dates and figures and events. It's not a story so much as an encyclopedia entry. Eales dug up tons of stuff and interviewed lots of people and meticulously documented, footnoted, and indexed everything. It must have been hard work, so maybe he figured his readers should do some work, too.

It has none of the subtlety, lightness, or quirkiness of a Steve Goodman song. Maybe that's too much to expect.

At the same time, the Twins record book is fascinating. It is a simple, straghtforward, thorough compilation of numbers and dates and names. But of course it doesn't aspire to be anything more. It is endless fun to leaf through and dig around and explore. Mabe that's how the Eales book should be approached -- randomly leaf through it, picking up supriseing little nuggets.

The Holes script will soon be mandatory daily reading. I went and got myself cast as the Attorney General of Texas, a sheriff, an 18th century Latvian pig farmer, and some other bit part. The show will be at the Northfield Arts Guild Theatre in July. Get your tickets early.

Ale

2008-05-22T10:18:00.023-05:00

In response to an October 2007 post about ale, several readers told me I should try Bell's, Boulevard, and Fat Tire. So I did.

Bell's Oberon Ale (Bell's Brewing, Kalamazoo and Comstock, Michigan): This is a wheat ale that the brewery labels a Summer ale. I don't pretend to know what distinguishes a summer ale from any other seasonal brew (or brew-of-the-month or a Thursday brew, for that matter). Maybe I should wait until a really hot day in August to give this ale a fair shot. Anyway, It's just OK. A bit too light and citrus-y for my taste. Bell's has a huge lineup of ales, porters, lagers, and other stuff (eighteen, to be exact), so it would take me a year or so to sample all their varieties. Sounds like a worthy resolution!

Boulevard Lunar Ale (Boulevard Brewing, Kansas City, Missouri): A very nice medium-dark ale. Looks good in the glass. Hearty without being heavy. They use a little chocolate malt in the recipe, which helps give it some color and some body. Boulevard's pale ale is quite nice, too.

Fat Tire Amber Ale (New Belgium Brewing Company, Fort Collins, Colorado): This is very good. Caramelly. Smooth. I recall reading that Fat Tire uses a bottle-fermentation process that closely approximates the cask-conditioning used in what Rob Hardy calls "real" ales. Whatever. Fat Tire costs a little more, but its superior taste justifies the small price difference. Cute label, too.

Any other reactions, reviews, or recommendations?

Bizarro Baseball World: A Night of Firsts

2008-05-20T08:19:00.017-05:00

Here are some things that happened at the Dome last night to make my score card a real fun mess.

Bobby Korecky's first major league at bat.

Bobby Korecky's first major league hit. This was also the first hit by a Twins pitcher in an American League game since the infernal designated hitter rule was adopted back in 1973. Korecky was batting because the Twins had given up the DH by moving their starting DH, Brendan Harris (Yes, Brendan Harris started at DH, which I'm pretty sure was also a first), to second base.

Bobby Korecky's first major league win. (That's Korecky as a collegian in the picture at left). Right place, right time for Korecky, who pitched out of a jam created by Juan Rincon (the Jam Master) in the 11th, then a 1-2-3 12th. Rincon was visited on the mound by the pitching coach in the 11th. During the same at bat, the manager tried to pay a visit to the mound (presumably to change pitchers) but that's a no-no. Gardenhire was stopped by the ump and sheepishly returned to the dugout. First time I've ever seen that.

Alexi Casilla's first major league home run.

Michael Cuddyer's first major league game in center field. He has now played every position except pitcher and catcher. He started in center because Carlos Gomez was hurt and Craig Monroe is old and tired. But Gomez came in to pinch run late in the game, stayed in to play center field (Cuddyer moved to right field), and ended up singling in the 12th and scoring the winning run.

When that run scored, Livan (The Prince) Hernandez was on deck. Livan is a starting pitcher. The Twins had simply run out of position players. If Livan had batted, that would have been another first (two pitchers from same AL team batting in the same AL game in the DH era).

This was also the first game of a very odd Twins marketing effort. For $33.00, you could buy an upper deck general admission ticket that also entitled the bearer to unlimited concessions (except beer) throughout the game. That the game went 12 innings (four hours) was a bonus for the many fans who bought those tickets.

A bizarre experience from start to finish.

New poem (small)

2008-05-16T12:59:00.003-05:00

Intersection
Jim Haas

The grade is deceptively mild.
In winter, drivers going east sometimes can’t
get their cars through the intersection
and drivers going west come sliding through
out of control.

They wonder what just happened.

It’s like the anti-gravity mountain passes
where a car in neutral appears to go up hill
because one’s senses have been fooled.

It’s a trick of light and shadow,
of subtlety and a subconscious willingness to be taken in.

We hate surprises, except that they delight and amaze.
Where fear and desire cross paths.

Women In Politics

2008-05-15T12:47:00.006-05:00

My aunt Dixie was the longest-serving elected official in the history of Elkhart, Indiana, having served for eons as the City Clerk. My cousin Sue -- Dixie’s daughter -- is now the City Clerk.

My grandmother was a Massachusetts Republican back when there was almost no such thing. She worked on the senate campaign of Ed Brooke* and the gubernatorial campaigns of John Volpe. She was a delegate to the 1960 Republican National Convention in Chicago. So was aunt Dixie. Nixon was the nominee, although aunt Dixie really preferred a young actor named Ronald Reagan and Grandma was pledged to Nelson Rockefeller. She never liked Nixon.

These two were pioneers of a sort, both pretty fierce in their beliefs about advancing women’s rights and activism and all that. I guess Republicans were a little different in those days.

My mom went to the convention as a visitor and somehow got onto the main convention floor. We have a wonderful picture of my mom and aunt Dixie and some of the Indiana delegates with then-Senator Homer Capehart. Homer looked as though he’d been up all night drinking and eating pancakes, complete with rumpled coat and stained necktie. (I’ve always wondered if Homer Simpson were modeled after the portly senator from Indiana.)

That convention featured a last-minute, behind-closed-doors deal between Nixon and Rockefeller, his chief rival for the nomination. The deal assured Nixon’s nomination but, according to most accounts, Nixon had it sewn up anyway. His need for such a deal is now seen as evidence of Nixon’s raging insecurities.

I hope Senators Obama and Clinton can reach some kind of accord before the convention, although it might be the highest form of political theatre if the nomination isn’t won on the first ballot.

It will be interesting to see if Michelle Bachmann can keep from hurling herself at John McCain when he comes to this year’s convention in St. Paul.

* Brooke has been in the news lately because Barbara Walters claims she had an affair with him long, long ago. Commendably, he’s maintained his silence on the matter.

Juxtaposition

2008-05-14T12:10:00.014-05:00

The Minneapolis Star-Tribune (AKA Strib) South Metro section had the following entry in this morning's edition under "Police Blotter"

Northfield. Police responded to a report of two young men selling shampoo door to door in the 700 block of Meadow View Drive. Officers advised the pair that they had to get the appropriate city permit.

Soon after reading this, I picked up our office copy of the Northfield News. It has a banner headline about the county sheriff investigating heroin and cocaine use among young adults in Northfield. Several deaths related to the drugs have been reported in recent months.

The first story raises lots of questions. Why would anybody buy shampoo from a door-to-door salesman? You can get a jug of decent shampoo for a buck at the grocery store.* Second, why would city government have anything at all to do with door-to-door sales of shampoo (or dentures or convertible debentures or eyeglasses or shot glasses or anything else)? What ever happened to the free-market economy? Commerce! Enterprise! Caveat emptor!

The second story is very disturbing and also raises many questions, most of them unanswerable.

The juxtaposition of these two items made me wonder about the news judgement of the Star Tribune. Which Northfield crime story is newsworthy? Let's see.... unauthorized door-to-door shampoo sales or young men dying of drug overdoses. Tough call.

* Some friends, one of whom is a retired physician, have recently mentioned that washing hair isn't even necessary. Left alone, they say, the scalp will produce just the right amount of oil. The shampooed pate is apparently an artificial environment -- the tonsorial equivalent of a bonsai tree. I'm still planning to frequently wash what little hair I have.

I'll Grant You That (Part III)

2008-05-07T12:26:00.026-05:00

Two recent announcements posted on Grants.gov. Too good to pass up.

DOI
Department of the Interior
Bureau of Land Management
Atlantic Rim Coalbed Natural Gas Mule Deer Study (Phase II)
Grant

Rowan: You're going to study mule deer?
Martin: Yup!
[pause]
Rowan: And what is it about mule deer that you're going to study, Dick?
Martin: Gas.
Rowan: Gas?
Martin: Yup. Natural gas.
Rowan: Dick, I'm sorry, but I don't think I get the connection between natural gas and mule deer.
Martin: Hee! What's not to get?
Rowan: You mean...?
Martin: Yup. The mule deer produce the gas. We're going to study how they do it.
Rowan: You mean you don't know how they do it?
Martin: Wellllll...we don't know enough about how they do it, especially how it's related to coalbeds back east.
Rowan (shaking head): Well, Dick, I wish you luck in your studies. When do you leave?
Martin: We're off to Weymouth in the morning!
Rowan (sotto voce): He's off, all right.

DOD
Department of Defense
Office of Naval Research
NAVAL FACILITIES ENGINEERING COMMAND
Mojave tui chub Management at Naval Weapons Station China Lake, California
Modification 1

How hard can it be to manage a little fishy at a Naval Weapons Station? I mean, who has the weapons? The tui chub is considered an invasive species. So...what's to manage? At the risk of sounding indelicate, why not just kill the little bastards? China Lake lies in the Mojave desert between Bakersfield and Las Vegas -- nobody there cares about the damned chub.

Edit: Apparently there are several species of tui chub. Some of them are considered invasive, some are considered native, and some are considered endangered. The species called Mojave tui chub is, I gather, endangered because it left its natural habitat of the Mojave River and is now found only in a couple of small lakes or ponds near the Mojave River. So I guess it's possible that a species can be both invasive (that is, it didn't originate where it now lives) and endangered. My cavalier statement about nobody caring may be generally true but there are a few exceptions. Some biology teachers and students are trying to figure out how to forestall the extinction of the Mojave tui chub. They have a blog (surprise!) . In the interest of fair and balanced reporting, here's a link to "Working With The Mojave Tui Chub."

Brautigan spring

2008-05-05T12:59:00.008-05:00

Goodness sakes, the sun has shone brightly for two days. In a row!

My lovely wife and I are considering, along with thousands of other people, planting a garden this year. Some years ago, we tried growing vegetables and flowers and didn't have much luck. The soil around our house is poor, we have no expertise in these matters, and it seems like a lot of work. Many generations of rabbits have made their home beneath our deck and this year's bunny brood will enthusiastically attack any young shoots, I'm sure.

Still, we'll give it a go.

Richard Brautigan's fourth collection of poetry was called "Please Plant This Book." Each poem was printed on the back of a seed packet. It is one of the few Brautigan books I do not own.

Here are two selections from "Please Plant This Book" (1968):

Parsley

I thank the energy, the gods and the
theater of history that brought
us here to this very moment with
this book in our hands, calling
like the future down a green and
starry hill.

Squash

The time is right to mix sentences
sentences with dirt and the sun
with punctuation and the rain with
verbs, and for worms to pass
through question marks, and the
stars to shine down on budding
nouns, and the dew to form on
paragraphs.

First Place?

2008-05-04T10:37:00.004-05:00

Don't look now, but the Minnesota Twins are leading the American League Central Division by a half game.

Of course we hope that the lead does not disappear like a desert mirage, but we fear it will. That's the essence of Twins fandom, this year especially -- that mixture of hope and fear.

Is this foreshadowing or teasing? A springboard or the apogee of the season?

Stay (as the saying goes) tuned.

All the President's Men

2008-04-29T10:33:00.031-05:00

I've mentioned before on this blog how much I enjoy "Big League Poets" by Mikhail Horowitz. Mr. Horowitz also contributes to Elysian Fields Quarterly, which bills itself as a baseball literary magazine. He constructs rosters with a theme. Here's one of my own fantasy rosters, using players who are named for or have the same last name as one of our country's presidents.

First the lineup, then the commentary.

All the Presidents, Man

Infield:
1b Brian “Buck” Buchanan
2b Woodrow Wilson Williams
SS U.L. Washington
3b John Kennedy
C Gary Carter

Outfield:
RF Lew Ford
CF Trot Nixon (Christopher Trotman Nixon)
LF Joseph Jefferson Jackson

Other:
SP Grover Cleveland Alexander
RP Franklin Delano Roosevelt Wieand
DH Reggie Jackson
PH Randy Bush

Brian “Buck” Buchanan (1b): It's a stretch (so to speak) to put him at first base, because he was primarily an outfielder and DH. But he did appear at 1b in 43 of his 213 big league games, most likely not as a late-inning defensive substitution. He played for the Twins for a while and it always pained me to watch him run.

Woodrow Wilson Williams (2b): 1938 through 1945. Woody Williams made over 1,300 plate appearances, mostly for Cincinnati.

U.L. Washington (ss): Man, I liked U.L. Partly for his name, but mostly for that toothpick.

John Kennedy (3b): 1962 to 1974. Over 2,000 plate appearances for six teams in both leagues, including the short-lived Seattle Pilots. He was playing the year his presidential namesake was shot.

Gary Carter (c): Carter was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2003. Jimmy Carter won the Nobel Peace Prize the year before.

Lew Ford (RF): Leeewww!

Trot Nixon (CF): When Nixon ranges over into right field and almost bumps into Ford, he can say "pardon me."

Joseph Jefferson Jackson (LF): You might know him better as Shoeless Joe.

Grover Cleveland Alexander (SP): Not only named for a president, but for an emperor, too.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt Wieand (RP): This gentleman with the complete presidential appellation pitched a grand total of 6.3 innings in the majors, all in relief.

Reggie Jackson (DH): If he had been running for President, he'd be called Mr. November.

Randy Bush (PH): How'd you like to be known as a great bench player? Bush was said to be one of the best pinch hitters in the game, and it may be true.

On the way to work...

2008-04-27T08:54:00.023-05:00

So the Twins bats kind of came alive against Texas in the first two games of that series. Morneau hit a grand slam (and they still lost) , Cuddyer came back from the DL to hit a three-run blast. Delmon Young got a couple of RBI. Then they fell asleep again in the third game. Gonna be a long year.

These are the kinds of things I think about on the way to work. Also...

Rice County, where I live and work, has some interesting contrasts: suburban sprawl, quaint small towns, and the predominant still-rural feel. Some mornings, on my short drive through the countryside to work, I will see very few other cars. That's nice.

Other things I've seen on the drive to work:

Bald eagles
Blue herons
Red-tailed hawks

White egrets

Wild turkeys

Ring-necked pheasant

Ducks

Geese

Barn swallows

Gulls
Beavers
Muskrats
Raccoons (mostly carrion)

Skunks

Cats 'n' dogs
Deer
Squirrels (black, brown, red)
Horses (domesticated, including some massive Belgian draft horses)
Burros *
Sheep
Pigs**

Turtles (sunning themselves on a big rock in an oxbow off the Cannon River)

Green algae
A rusted-out Jeepster
Several barns and sheds that are slowly succumbing to gravity

All in all, it's a pleasant drive, even in winter.

* I can understand why people around here raise horses, even when those horses aren't intended for work or racing. But burros?

** On the first truly beautiful spring day this year, I was watching a gentleman in a Mazda Miata, top down, zipping along the country road, enjoying the sun and scenery. About half way home, we drove along Pork Chop Ridge, so named because it is occupied by a large hog-raising operation. The smell was overpowering. Ah, springtime!

Twins hitting: Oxymoron?

2008-04-25T14:00:00.008-05:00

The Twins have three of the greatest hitters in franchise history to help out during spring training -- Tony Oliva, Rod Carew, and Harmon Killebrew. Yet the team struggles to get on base and struggles even more to score runs. What's the deal here? Yeah, it's still only April, and Cuddyer's been on the DL. Morneau and Mauer are notoriously slow starters. But...damn!

I had in mind a longer post, comparing the Twins to their central division rivals in all the offensive statistical categories, but then I decided it's not worth the energy it takes to do that. Maybe Joe Vavra can do that when he's not screwing up Delmon Young's swing, or whoever Bill Smith has as his gopher can run the numbers. Or maybe Aaron Gleeman, who's pretty damn good with those stats, can (or has) put them up on his blog.

This team is going to be fun to watch because of the new faces (Gomez, Tolbert, young Mr. Young) but hard to watch because they'll hover around .500 all year, which is just painful for fans like me. They won't be lovable losers or surprise winners, they'll just be mediocre. Ah, well, it's still baseball and we still have decent seats (in the Dome, those are hard to come by).

And the guys at Allright Hamilton! are still pretty funny.

C'est la baseball.