All posts by junesboy

It Could Be the Last Thing You Do

Baseball, , , , ,

Baseball musings while watching Alfredo Simon make a pitching career out of the first inning (48 pitches already and still flingin’ – I’m guessin’ he’s not gonna get a complete game outta this) on a balmy evening (39 degrees and still droppin’) in Chicago. Night games…in Chicago…in April…what kind of mind…? This game is currently on a pace to last 6 ½ hours.

Hey, not to worry, more time to muse. It’s baseball, baby.

Yesterday I caught a few minutes of a Dodgers game described by Vin Scully. One of the batters was blessed with “Socrates” as his first name. Mr. Scully proceeded to give us a biography of the Greek philosopher AND a play-by-play of what it’s like to die from drinking hemlock AND a pitch-by-pitch description of the batter’s plate appearance. You can’t get that kind of service from any other sport.

Right now I’m listening and learning about the circulatory system of ducks as imparted by Thom Brenneman while the Reds pitcher tries to lay down a bunt. You can learn a lot useful stuff in a baseball game.

But what I’m thinkin’ ‘bout tonight is the fearful responsibility involved when buying a ticket to a baseball game. We take it lightly, but think about it.

It could be the last thing you do.

If the game is tied at the end of nine innings we don’t stop playing by the regular rules of baseball until we have a winner. No matter how many innings that may take.

We don’t have clocks, or ties, or judges’ decisions, or goal kicks, or coin flips. We play on. Theoretically, any game you decide to attend could last forever.

Cool……………and a little scary.

W. P. Kinsella wrote SHOELESS JOE, the book the fine baseball film FIELD OF DREAMS was based upon. His next novel was another fine baseball book; THE IOWA BASEBALL CONFEDERACY. In it, he posits exactly such an eternal baseball game. I recommend it. Oh, don’t get anxious, it’s only 310 pages long and it has an ending.

So, the next time someone asks you if you’d like to catch a baseball game, stop and ponder if you’re really ready for that kind of commitment.

I pretty much always am.

She Chose Poorly and Often

Movies, , , , ,

Movie Night!

Tonight’s delight is a perennial favorite from Spain and West Germany; THE WEREWOLF VS THE VAMPIRE WOMAN (1971). Maybe “perennial” is a bit strong. Maybe “favorite” is a bit strong.

What’s that? The title’s not familiar to you?

Perhaps you know it as SHADOW OF THE WEREWOLF, or LA NOCHE DE WALPURGIS, or SATAN VS THE WOLF MAN…….or BLOOD MOON?

Could it possibly be you’ve never seen this epic?

Lucky you.

This is a jolly little lycanthropic tale featuring Paul Naschy (aka Jacinto Molina), an ex-circus strongman who fashioned a career by playing a werewolf in about a dozen films. I guess you could think of Mr. Naschy as the Lon Chaney Jr. of Spain…I guess. But I think he just ran away from the circus to meet girls.

In this flick, he met Gaby Fuchs.

Gaby Fuchs plays a young vampire researcher with a mass of red hair and a mass of poor judgement as demonstrated;

  • She falls in love with the werewolf within 24 hours of meeting him.
  • She allows her girlfriend into her bedroom though she knows she’s a vampire with less than sisterly leanings.
  • She accepts a ride to the town’s post office with a truly creepy guy who explains; “I’m afraid the post office is closed, but I’d like to show you our butcher shop.” Can I buy a ticket for that tour?
  • Her outfits.

The titular vampire is veiled, impervious to bullets, adroit with chains and manacles, laughs a lot, and moves in slow-motion; an unusual skill set for 1971, but could perhaps qualify her to run for president today.

I loved it.

A Great Scrubbing of the World?

Movies, Uncategorized, ,

Movie night!

I like Peter Weir movies and tonight I’m watching THE LAST WAVE.

This flick gets ripped for being obscure and for not solving the mystery.

I will grant the latter. I think one of the responsibilities of artists who trade in mysteries in movies and books is they must, at some point, solve the mystery. Is that too much to ask? In both THE LAST WAVE and PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK. Mr. Weir chooses not to do so. I still like both films.

I will however, take issue with the accusation of obscurity.

Since my teens, I’ve had a literary addiction to novels and stories of the supernatural. One of my favorite British authors is from the early 20th century; Arthur Machen. Machen writes often of nature in revolt – of nature, thought to be tamed, but perpetually about to bust out and re-exert dominance over man in disorienting and disturbing ways. In this light, THE LAST WAVE makes amazing sense.

Nature hovers. Disturbing and disorienting intrusions occur.

  • Baseball-sized hail falls from a cloudless sky.
  • From his protective bubble of a car in a torrential downpour, Richard Chamberlain sees;
    • A man with an extreme umbrella drinking from a water fountain. Why doesn’t just open his mouth? No, he chooses the “tame” water over nature’s wild water.
    • A poster for the local zoo featuring apes gazing back at Chamberlain in his car. Who’s really caged and on display?
    • Vehicles crawling through snarled traffic with icons on them featuring the image of a jungle cat; jaguars in the streets.
  • At Chamberlain’s home, with the maelstrom outside continuing to rage, turning the windows of the home into images like of the inside of a dishwasher, water appears inside the house flowing down the stairs. We immediately assume there’s been a leak from the outside, but it turns out to be a bathtub overflowing. Water thought to be tamed…
  • Chamberlain’s wife admits that she’s a fourth-generation Australian, but she’s never met an aboriginal. She’s lived distanced from nature, behind societal barriers that now appear to be quite fragile.

This is not obscure. It’s mysterious and ominous, but not obscure. We think we’ve tamed and sealed out nature from our lives. (Climate change? Pshaw!)

But nature will persist. It will find a way past our barriers. It will win. How scary is that? Nothing obscure at all.

It’s a fine and effective film.

Give the Other Man His Chance

Baseball, ,

Well, my Reds finally have a chance to get back in the playoffs…probably for about fifteen minutes.

Barely a winning season record, warning track power, no launch angles, exit velo well within the local speed limits…

Analytics…they’ll kill ya.

Still, I watch.

It’s baseball. It’s my beloved Reds. They might win any night…they might……s’possible.

As disconcerting as the year meanders, it still illustrates with every game another of the many reasons to cherish the sport. Every final inning contains a chance of victory or failure. No matter how big a lead may be, the winning team must play major league caliber baseball and get those last three outs. No coasting.

Roger Angell in his very satisfying collection THE SUMMER GAME, quotes Earl Weaver in his 1969 explanation of the Orioles’ unexpected loss of the World Series to the Mets;

“You can’t sit on a lead and run a few plays into the line and just kill the clock. You’ve got to throw the ball over the goddam plate and give the other man his chance. That’s why baseball is the greatest game of them all.”

No stalling. No waiting for the clock to run out.

“…give the other man his chance.”

Perhaps our elected officials should be watching a bit more baseball. Frankly, as far as our current elected officials are concerned, I’m more than ready to give another man (or woman) their chance!

( geezer grumping off to cypher some more about spin rates…)

Baseball Rhapsody

Baseball

April 4, 2016

Stop the presses!

The only sport that matters opened its 2016 season this afternoon in Cincinnati. Oh sure, there were a few games played yesterday and we’ll count those results out of pity, but we know what’s right and what’s wrong. The season doesn’t truly begin until the first pitch flies in Cincy.

It flew today and it flew well.

I love baseball for many reasons and many of them were on display today.

Frankly, things look grim for my beloved Reds this year.

  • This year’s Reds came into this season looking like the second worst team in baseball. That was before they opened the season today with their entire starting pitching rotation on the disabled list.
  • They started an outfield today in which Jay Bruce was the greatest offensive threat. Mr. Bruce had his worst year in baseball in 2015. He batted about .226 and spent the winter waiting to be traded. He continues to wait. He’s the best outfielder we have.
  • Our all-star third-baseman was traded in the winter and has been replaced by a young player who has not previously played the position.
  • Our shortstop only played about 40 games last year due to injury.
  • Our catcher only played about half of last year due to injury.
  • Our second-baseman has a clause in his contract that allowed him to refuse multiple off-season attempts to trade him. How inspiring for him to be playing for a team that wishes he would go away.

Given all those happy considerations, why watch ‘em?

Day-to-day baseball is not played on paper. We play the games every day, and every day is new flip of the coin, a new chance to catch the grounder you didn’t/couldn’t catch before, a new chance to hit the curve you didn’t/couldn’t hit before, a new chance to clip the corner of the plate with a come-back fastball that missed yesterday…you get the idea.

The Reds won today. They won!

The starting pitcher pitched well: the bullpen pitched better. The outfielders didn’t hit, but they made sterling plays in the field. The young third-baseman fielded his position well. The shortstop looked healthy and got three hits.

They made the catch. They made the throw. They got the hit. They won the game.

They may lose the next 161, but they won TODAY.

The largest opening day crowd in Cincinnati history watched them win. Why were they there?

Because baseball is all about hope – not great, grand, life-changing hope for the future – but daily hope; hope that today could be better than yesterday. Oh sure, it might not be, but that’s OK too – after all, we’re gonna play again tomorrow!

I love baseball.