Various Observations in Written Form

It's official. I'm still pretty much 11 years old.

2009-07-14T21:27:00.000-07:00

Autographs. I've never been a big fan of them. If I'm close to a celebrity, I tend to want to take their picture rather than be a big disruption (so Kinnearing is a possible outcome). When I was a kid, I waited in line to get Dan Issel's autograph, and one of my most prized possessions was a basketball autographed by the 78/79 Denver Nuggets. But I can't remember the last time I got an autograph. Most occasions to gather autographs would entail me elbowing my way through a forest of kids anyhow, and that's out of the question.

But on Saturday, I attended a pretty cool talk by Portland-area MLB greats (Dale Murphy, Johnny Pesky, Scott Brosius, and a few others who aren't as household-name). After the talk, when the line for autographs stretched around most of the outfield, Swankette and I ducked out. "I don't know what I'd have them sign anyway," I said.

Pause. Light bulb.

"Actually, it'd be cool if I brought my scorebook. The could sign under their name for a game I saw them play."

"Wow!" Swankette was impressed. I love this woman because, among countless other reasons, she understands the things I would find very cool. "Now THAT would be worth waiting in line for!"

To be fair, the only person on the panel I'd seen play was Brosius. I figured it'd be cool to pick out his best performance in my presence (reviewing the stats, it'd be this game where he hit a home run for the historic 1998 team), and have his signature right there in my scorebook.

Fast-forward to today.

For Beavers' season ticket holders like me (sorry, Jack), today was set aside for the chance to watch AAA All-Stars take batting practice and to get autographs from the players and coaches.

I sat down with the rosters and referred to my Access Database (yes, I actually have one) of stats in games I have attended. I looked for each player. About half had played in my presence...a handful in past major league games, a bunch in recent Beaver games, but significant numbers in long-ago games at lower levels all across the US.

I put sticky notes in my scorebooks, headed to the ballpark, and waited in some lines.

Much of the autograph-seeker culture feels a little slimy to me. I didn't care for the guys there who asked ballplayers to sign three, four, five, even as many as eight copies of the same card. The ushers in charge clearly said one item per player, but people ignored it--including the players, who probably didn't want to be seen as stingy. I guess I don't know why an adult would want eight cards signed. It's not a really great financial move. My 1985 Topps set, still in the box and in near-mint condition, has only doubled in value from $20-ish to $40 over the last quarter century. They wouldn't be worth THAT much more signed, would they?

Of course, in a way, I should talk. I was in line right with them. But I was having them sort of officially mark past games they'd been in...the verb "consecrate" isn't quite right, since ballplayers aren't holy, but there it is anyway.

The result was different from what I expected.

The ballplayers were sort of rotely scribbling their names on whatever was put in front of them...cards, bats, balls, programs. Few adults talked to the players (and what would they talk about anyway?). Some players would give kids a thrill by chatting a little, which was nice.

When I would walk up, though, they'd have this different experience.

For instance, I got to J.D. Martin, an all-star from the Rochester Red Wings (AAA in the Nationals system...if you count the Nats as major league...)

"Hi! Could you sign this scorecard down by your name? I think it's your first start for Kinston."

His response: "Wow!"

Next to him, pitcher Jim Miller said this: "Now THAT'S impressive."

But what was fun is that I sort of got to SHARE these past games with the players.

Nelson Figueroa is a AAA all-star this year, but in 2002 he was in the rotation of a horrendous Brewers team. I saw him pitch a game that April.

"Could you sign this scorecard from a game you pitched for Milwaukee back in '02?"

Figueroa: "Wow! I actually got into a game?" [Quite well-spirited and tongue-in-cheek. I was worried a little about players being upset or wistful about major-league appearances. They were not.]
Me: "Yep. You started. It was the first game after the manager was fired."
Him: "Yeah! Davy Lopes! And it looks like we won!"

What I liked best about doing this was the way that the players would perk up when they saw what they were signing. Almost all asked one thing: "How'd I do?" Because I tried to pick out their best games, I usually got them in a good mood.

Portland's Chad Huffman signed a game from his days as a Eugene Emerald. He habitually began signing "Chad Huffman #17," but then stopped. "Wait. What number did I wear that year?" I saw it was 31, and said so...so Chad Huffman signed his name as "Chad Huffman #31" for the first time since he was in the Northwest League.

Colorado Springs Sky Sox outfielder Matt Miller signed a game I saw him play as a Modesto Nut.

HIM: "How'd I do?"
ME: "One-for-four with a walk and a run scored."
HIM: "Yeah...[signs]...I see here I had a strikeout. I remember that. It was a bad call."
ME: [examines the scorebook] "It was swinging, Matt."
[he laughs]

When I then asked the guy next to him to sign a game I'd seen him play as a Chicago Cub, he remarked that I clearly "get around."

Yup. I do.

[Nearly-40-year-old former-high-school-nerd still likes props from jocks. Film at 11.]

The Beavers' Scott Patterson said that he'd never been asked to sign a scorebook or scoresheet before, but Fresno's Kevin Pucetas, seated next to him, said that mine was the third he'd signed that day. Maybe I started a trend. I hope so.

Because rather than commodifying their signatures, the signature was an opportunity to share their game with them. Fans don't often get to do that, really, on a one-to-one basis.

So the net result of this is that I am now into autographs. I will NOT seek them out during batting practice, after games, or anywhere else where I would be competing with kids for ballplayers' attention. That's just wrong. But I'll keep an eye out for events like this one where there are autographs to be signed, check my scorebooks, pick out a game, and ask the ballplayer (or ex-ballplayer) to sign them. I had enough fun yesterday to justify doing it again under similar circumstances. And when I do, whether I'm getting a signature from a career minor-leaguer or from a Hall-of-Famer, you can rest assured that he'll say this:

"How'd I do?"

Not a bad choice to make, I guess

2009-07-13T23:29:00.000-07:00

For reasons too complex to go into here, I wound up having a conversation about strip clubs with a friend/advisee tonight. I've never been to a strip club. I asked him if there's one out there that I might actually enjoy. (I'm not certain I'd enjoy it. I'd feel bad for the dancer.)

"Oh yeah." He gave the name of the place. "It's just a dive bar, low key. You'd be able to sit at the bar and watch the Mariner game. The girls are at a pole in the corner. They aren't overly made up, there's no MC or DJ, and they get to pick their own music."

"Hmmm. I wonder if, given the choice between breasts and the Mariners, which I would look at."

"At this place? You'd watch the Mariners, but you'd be aware of the girl."

Not sure what that meant, but I knew who to ask.

My wife is aware of my love of baseball and my love of breasts. Which would win?

"Honey, if I were at a strip club and there were a Mariner game on, do you think I'd watch the stripper or watch the Mariners?"

She thought, deeply, for longer than I thought she would. And then, my dear, wonderful wife asked this question:

"This year's Mariners, or last year's?"

State Memories Project: Nevada

2009-07-12T21:32:00.000-07:00

No need to repeat myself. I'll just send you to the post I wrote right after it happened.

Psalm 66

2009-07-12T08:48:00.000-07:00

When the Psalmist wrote "Make a joyful noise unto God," what noise was he thinking about?

I think it might be the squeaking my son makes as he practices rolling over.

Don't let the door hit you, Yuniesky

2009-07-10T19:57:00.000-07:00

The Mariners unloaded Yuniesky Betancourt today, who has had it coming for a long time. The long-suffering Royals took him off our hands for a couple of prospects (although we'll be sending some cash as well).

Curious as to the reaction, I hunted down a Royals blog and checked out the comments. In there, I found this exchange, which is as hilarious as it is tasteless:

MARINER FAN: Seriously...this is like the US Cavalry giving a small pox blankets to the Native Americans. My condolences.

ROYAL FAN #1: To be fair, It’s like giving the blanket after the village is already infected. Is one more crappy SS even going to matter at this point?

ROYAL FAN #2: Yeah, it's more like, while they're dying of small pox, you kick them in the nads.

I'll be giggling about this for a while. Ashamedly, but definitely.

Cue Beavis and Butthead laugh in 3...2...

2009-07-09T20:01:00.000-07:00

Just a minute ago on the Mariner game, Dave Sims and Mike Blowers were commenting on Mariner farmhand James McOwen, who hit in his 45th consecutive game yesterday:

DAVE SIMS: "I understand his manager is going to give him a blow tonight. He's earned it."
MIKE BLOWERS: "I'll say."

State Memories Project: Nebraska

2009-07-08T20:48:00.000-07:00

I was high school age for one of our trips out east to Detroit when we stopped to visit a medical friend of my dad’s who had left Denver and was doctoring in Omaha. My dad and Dr. R were an unusual set of friends, I think; to this day, I can’t see what they have in common. But they’re close enough that they get together often, and even spent a week canoeing in the Boundary Waters up in Minnesota. They joked a lot about my dad’s high-brow culture tastes and Dr. R’s low-brow culture tastes. “Have you seen Top Gun?´ “Nope. Have you seen My Life as a Dog?´ “Nope.”

On this visit, however, one wacky moment with my mom took the cake. Somehow, we all wound up visiting the SAC museum, which mostly consisted of wandering on tarmacs in 100-degree heat looking at old planes. This might have been somewhat interesting for my dad, but it was not remotely my mom’s cup of tea. Nor mine.

We were inside an exhibit room where, in the middle of the room, was a glass case. Nothing was inside the glass case except a card with the words “This exhibit not yet completed” on it. Just the card. My mom decided that we should stand outside the non-exhibit and look into the glass case as though we were completely transfixed by the fascinating contents.

And we did. I put my hand up to my chin and stroked my imaginary beard. We squinted, leaned, and even whispered to each other to have conversations about the imaginary exhibit. Predictably, people would walk up to the glass case, look inside, look at my mom and me, look inside again, and walk away with some combination of pity, confusion, and irritation.

It was a hell of a fun five minutes. Try it next time you see something similar in a museum. And from my mom…who, like me, is a bit of a rule-follower...it felt just subversive enough to surprise me, and it was quite hilarious.

A warm welcome...

2009-07-08T20:45:00.000-07:00

to my kid sister, who began blogging tonight.

Learning from the baby

2009-07-01T07:52:00.000-07:00

Monday night is Swankette's knitting night. That means I'm on baby duty solo for a few hours. Mostly we go on walks, read books, and play.

But the other day, as we tended to the in-laws' garage sale, we learned something Hedgehog likes.

He likes to look up at trees.

I decided to give that a shot. I put down a blanket and put the boy down under a tree in our backyard.

He was transfixed.

I decided this would be a great chance to get some reading done, so I grabbed a lawn chair and read. But I felt funny sort of hovering over my son like that. So I lay down next to him and read. But my arms got tired and heavy holding the book.

So I watched the tree with him. I explained to him some things about wind and leaves.

The sun was brightening a few leaves at the very top of the tree, which were sometimes obscured by the darker nearby leaves. The whole thing shifted in the wind like a kaleidoscope of green.

At one point, I closed one eye so that I would lose depth perception. A brown latticework of branches provided a proscenium for all the leaves, which maneuvered all around the brown.

We gave my son a middle name that matches my favorite transcendentalist writer, and Monday, he taught me a transcendentalist lesson--every now and then, put down the book and look at the tree.

Letter to Hedgehog: Month Four

2009-06-28T20:15:00.001-07:00

Dear Hedgehog,

Sometime this month you added laughter to the smiling. It was a fantastic addition to your repertoire, let me tell you. Because it's a cool, hearty laugh. All of the sounds you make are hearty. My dad, your grandpa, first heard you cry over the phone on your first day of existence and stated it was "a lusty cry." It remains so. But you skipped the giggles and went straight to guffaws. Deep-voiced (for you) haw-haws over your favorite things: chin tickles, gwotoms (that's a word your Uncle Dan invented for a five-fingered squeeze, the Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes game, nose touching, and beeping my nose are on the list.

And you develop like a house on fire. My mom, your grandma, saw you roll from back to front for the first couple of times (and dammit, I missed it...I was out of the house). You don't seem to get frustrated about anything...you just kind of take it at your pace and try to remember what caused you to do such a cool thing.

All parents think their kids are attractive, but I can't help but think of you as attractive in a surprising sort of traditional-Gerber way. I'm sure there's not any studies indicating whether good-looking infants become good-looking adults, but if you stay in the 95th percentile in height (I'm above that, so you might) and remain slender, and if you flash those satellite-dish uber-focused blue eyes that you inherited from your mom, you've got a shot at being a damned attractive adult. I hope that we raise you in a way that you have the confidence to go with it.

This month will be exciting...in fact, this week we're taking you on the first of many July 4th Minor League Baseball Road Trips. We'll see if our itinerary was too optimistic. I bet it's not...you're almost always a joy to travel. Only on the trip home from Seattle last week were you trouble. You would yell and even scream whenever we moved, but when we stopped (which was nearly every exit!), you'd chill out as soon as we got you out of the car seat. We were worried you'd suddenly decided you hated travel...but then, outside the Subway at exit 57, you let loose with the absolute mother of all poops. It was that, combined with some kind of strange pressure from the car seat, that was troubling you, and not travel. Thank goodness...because we'll have a LOT of travel in your near future! You'll have been to 11 states before you turn 7 months old. How many people can say that?

You're so immensely cool to hang out with. I know that parents can't exactly be friends with their kids, but until you learn how to sin (probably only a year or so off), I feel like we're buds. And I like it.

Love,
Dad

State Memories Project: Montana

2009-06-28T16:50:00.000-07:00

My oldest nephew, Matthew, was born on 10/4/92, three months premature and at a pound and 11 ounces, if memory serves. He was a member of the first generation to survive at that level of prematurity since they had just invented the drug that enhances lung development, which they gave my sister in the few critical days of bed rest before the emergency C-section. It obviously was touch-and-go for a while as to Matt’s survival, but he made it. So when I was invited up for Matt’s baptism--to serve as his godfather--over my Spring Break of 1993, it was even more joyous than most baptisms.

My parents picked me up at the Great Falls airport and drove me up to my sister and brother-in-law’s place in East Glacier Park (my brother-in-law was paying off his medical school debt by working on the nearby Blackfeet reservation). As a baptism gift, I had written a poem for Matt, and my mom asked me to read it as my dad drove. I did, and Mom cried. It surprised me a whole lot that my words had that kind of power. It started a gorgeous few days in Montana feeling immense joy with family as sunshine reflected off the snow.

State Memories Project: Missouri

2009-06-28T16:46:00.000-07:00

The decision to transfer out of the University of Missouri was a pretty clear one for me. I wasn’t being challenged in the slightest, getting a 4.0 while putting in almost no effort...constantly playing Spades and Outburst in the lounge, putting in no more time studying than I had in high school. But it was still a horrible experience buying all of those college guides again, mostly because somewhere deep inside I had a horrible, nagging fear of bungling my second college choice as badly as I had bungled the first. Thankfully, and in a bizarre coincidence, my academic advisor at Mizzou was my big sister, and my parents blessedly said that they knew I had made a big error, and that they would support my transfer wherever I wanted to go.

Still, I was a wreck. At 18, the college choice was the most important choice I had ever made on my own, and I’d failed it. Those who told (and tell) me—accurately, I think—that Missouri was a necessary part of figuring out who I was, that I obviously needed to make that mistake to mature, that I wouldn’t be who I am without it, that I probably never would have landed at Kenyon without...Mizzou…well, they didn’t (and don’t) make me feel any less stupid about making the mistake of going to a college that didn’t have a prayer at stimulating me intellectually as an undergrad.

I was in that mindset one morning—probably mid-October—when I walked back to my dorm from my Junior Honors Shakespeare class (Mizzou was so stunned to have me at all that they broke all the rules and let me cut in front of a large waiting list to take it). I was transported by the discussion of whatever play we were working on, but as soon as I was back on Conley Avenue, my head was spinning again. Do I go small school, or large? Would majoring in English screw up my desire to be a sportscaster? Should I transfer at semester and abandon my budding Missouri friendships or tough it out for a year and do an easier, after-one-year switch? And, most scarily, how would I know I wasn’t screwing up again?

I may have been shaking. It was that stressful.

Back in 628 Mark Twain Hall, I fell asleep and had a dream. In this dream, my beloved AP English teacher from high school stood before me. She simply told me to calm down, and that everything would be all right. Big school or small, English or something else, end of year or at semester…I remember her saying “You’ll be fine. You’ll be great.”

I wasn’t shaking when I woke up. Breathing had normalized, and my notoriously overactive mind had calmed quite a bit.

By the end of the day, I’d written my old teacher a letter saying that, although she didn’t know she did it, she traveled 700 miles into my consciousness that afternoon to make what was a cataclysmic life crisis into something I could handle.

In which I solve two health mysteries

2009-06-19T07:59:00.001-07:00

When asked my weight, I usually say 185. That's about where I leveled out in my late 20s. I've been as high as 215 (after vocal problems kept me from refereeing for three years) and as low as 135 (that'd be my sophomore year of HS...I'd more or less reached my current height by then...seriously, I should put a picture up here someday; it was freaky-scary).

To be sure, over the course of a year, 185 is usually my best-case scenario. I'm that at the end of the basketball season, and head up to 190-195 for the rest of the year.

I was 185 at the end of the most recent basketball season, and I began my usual 9-month regiment of not-exercising-much...I prepared for the usual 5-10 pound gain.

About a month ago, I hopped on the scale.

173.

That ain't right.

About the same time, my wife hopped on the scale. She proclaimed that she had lost a bunch of weight lately. Although she has been looking pretty damn good even by her standards lately, I had to tell her that I believed the scale had given up the ghost.

We bought a new scale.

175.

WTF? I now weigh less than I have since 1994.

While wife has me eating fairly decently, I still go to Burgerville and Moxie's a little more often than I probably should (mostly during paper-grading binges). And I haven't exercised much since basketball season ended four months ago. Yeah, I dance with the boy at nights, and I've gone on maybe a half-dozen walks with him, but that's not enough to explain a 10-pound downturn.

I couldn't come up with anything unusual to cause weight loss until today, when I think I figured it out.

The only thing I've done differently these last few months is the Month Without Cheese. (My wife's weight-loss explanation is more obvious--all of her weight is exiting through her boobs.)

Could I possibly have lost 10 pounds just through that stunt? (And then managed to keep it off by being a little more thoughtful about unnecessary cheese consumptions since?

I know that correlation is not causation, but nonetheless, I think so. Nothing else adds up.

On the negative side, I've been having some vocal troubles. Not as serious as the really bad ones back in 2001, but I've been really vocally fatigued at the end of teaching days--even conversations.

Why?

I first noticed this back in March. I figured it was after a couple of weeks of library teaching, or the fact that I now teach in a room with a higher ceiling was finally catching up to me.

But then this morning, on the first of many morning constitutionals with my son, I noticed me talking to him, telling him what a good guy he was and giving a play-by-play of the things we were passing.

Due to Hedgehog's presence, not only am I talking more than I used to (as if this is possible!), but my "talking to Hedgehog" voice is very low, unsupported, and kind of gravelly.

Time to change that!

So, this summer:

--I have a goal to eat fruits or veggies every time I eat. This is not to say that I will eat nothing but fruits and veggies. It is to force me to eat them. When I want chips and salsa (which is often), I will have them, but I will eat a handful of carrots or an apple first.

--I will talk to the boy with vocal support.

--I will continue to watch my cheese intake.

--I will enjoy daily morning constitutionals with the boy.

If this works for a month or so, I may even add--gasp!--some weight training to do something about my rather pathetic upper body.

State Memories Project: Mississippi

2009-06-14T21:08:00.000-07:00

The only time I’ve been in Mississippi as a destination (I’d driven across previously) was for some kind of Teach for America pow-wow at a state park in Mississippi in early March of 1994.

I went with my teacher buddies Chris and Dan, who drank beer the whole way. I’m pretty sure that I must have driven, because I remember we made repeated attempts to set the American outdoor record for Longest Sustained Urination along the way. They beat me handily because they were drinking a lot of beer and I was not. But most of those attempts at the record were en route and therefore in Louisiana.

I remember sitting around a campfire chatting with friends and learning about John Candy’s death (It is in looking up the date of his death that I determined that I went to Mississippi on the first weekend of March, 1994). And then Chris, Dan and I found a spot to set up our tent, when Chris suggested that it was such a gorgeous night, and there weren’t any bugs…why not just put our sleeping bags on the mattress pads, forgo the tent, and sleep outside?

That’s what we did. I remember falling asleep in a state park under the stars with two friends. That’s Mississippi for me.

If I don't make it, I won't be alone

2009-06-09T06:26:00.001-07:00

The New York Times examines the demise of so very many blogs.

I'm still slogging away--at least until the State Memories project ends in December--but one blogger puts my difficulties into words perfectly:

“The Internet is different now,” she said over a cup of tea in Midtown. “I was too Web 1.0. You want to be anonymous, you want to write, like, long entries, and no one wants to read that stuff.”

I'm not ready for Twitter, but I can see me getting there from here.

Thanks to Joe, man with one of my favorite dead blogs, for pointing me in this direction.

To the people who make instructional videos for infant-related products and activities

2009-06-08T21:10:00.000-07:00

Dear people who make instructional videos for infant-related products and activities,

I hate you.

When I attempt to use you as a resource to figure out how to do something with my baby, I always leave with a complex.

I think it all started with Harvey Karp. You know, the Happiest Baby on the Block guy. Swankette brought home his video when Hedgehog was about a week or two old, and I watched it carefully. Harvey, I watched you swaddle a million babies. I watched you crook baby after baby in your forearm and balance and jiggle their heads in your hands. Without fail, you took them from demon-child level screeching to completely calm and chilling in about 2.03 seconds.

It was impressive...until I tried it.

First of all, it took me damn near forever to figure out that damn swaddle. By the time I could reasonably burrito the baby, the fourth trimester was damn near over. But now that I've got it down, you can rest assured that I'll be swaddling the boy right up to his high school graduation. I don't want to waste this new talent.

But the jiggling...well, I never did quite get it right. Or, more accurately, I think I may have figured it out once or twice before forgetting exactly what worked and how. It just never looked like yours do. I think you filmed the babies in your video with some kind of weird baby-stop-action photography, or else somehow snuck some melatonin into your hands and rubbed it into the infants' scalps.

The point being, you make me feel like a complete remedial case, both mentally and physically.

But you are not alone, Harvey. I have to include the instructions for the Moby and the Beco baby carriers in this pissed-off rant as well.

The Moby instructions I used were on YouTube. They, without fail, show women patiently explaining the origami they're doing with their Moby (which is basically a massive scarf). There are at least 6 folds in a Moby, all of which must be done JUST SO for your baby's safety. Furthermore, how to get Hedgehog into those folds is something that I never got close to figuring out. The babies in the videos do the most beautiful swan dives into the cloth and fall instantly asleep (unless they're gazing perfectly into their mothers' eyes (and by the way, there are NEVER dads in the Moby or Beco videos, at least not that I've seen).

In real life, babies don't usually care to go into the Moby so easily. I have to balance the baby on my left hand/shoulder, spinning him on one finger like I'm Meadowlark Lemon, while I figure out if I've put the right-shoulder sash in the right position, if I've got it loose enough to allow the baby to breathe, or if I've done all the steps right. If I lose focus on the balancing baby while checking the sash, or if I've forgotten one of the steps, or if I've done the Moby just a smidge too tight or too loose...well, then, my baby splatters his brains on the ground. One time, when Hedgehog decided he didn't want to be in the stroller anymore, I tried to negotiate the Moby while on the side of the road...and that asphalt down there did not look too forgiving while I held the baby up over shoulder level in one arm (a necessary move to get him in the Moby).

My point: Your damn videos and instruction manuals do not show the contortions and balance I need to use your product. They do not show failure. They do not show pissed-off babies wriggling to prevent entry into the Moby.

Worse than the Moby are the DVD instructions for the Beco. God, I hated those. We had bought a Beco only because I failed so miserably with the Moby (which Swankette still uses and loves, by the way).

I gathered the baby, got out the Beco, and watched this video.

The video had several problems that really pissed me off.

First of all, the model (who is clearly on nitrous oxide) is using a DOLL for part of the video. A DOLL. Not my son, who is yelling and screaming and trying to figure out what kind of medieval torture device I'm springing on him. She's cheating and using a damn doll.

Second, she's on a couch that is about fifteen feet away from the camera. Is the baby's arm beneath or above the straps? Is he/she hooked into the front part of the Beco's interior or the back? Where exactly are those buckles? How can I possibly see any of this?

And--perhaps most importantly--why is the baby (once they switched from the doll to a baby) drugged? Is it necessary for me to feed my baby barbiturates before placing him in the Beco?

I have to rewind several times. Meanwhile, my son, who is getting no attention because I have to focus on the video, gets angrier and angrier, yelling more and more. Because of the noise, I miss several instructions, causing me to have to rewind again. I consider using Swankette's old Cabbage Patch doll, but it's not large enough, and it also won't wriggle, writhe, and flail like my son does. I consider using the cat, but he'd probably just pee all over the new Beco. And it's not like I can just set my son down and repeatedly watch the DVD until I get everything figured out.

I get more and more frustrated...but I also have an epiphany. I see the conspiracy.

I realize that Harvey Karp has teamed up with the glassy-eyed Moby and Beco instructional models to crush my spirit. They have come together exclusively to make me feel like a drooling incompetent idiot who can't follow simple instructions even when his son's happiness and safety are at stake.

There's a happy ending to this, thankfully...I now can swaddle the baby with a reasonable success rate, and, after paying a visit to the Beco store to have an actual human being coach me to use it with my actual baby, I have mastered the Beco so thoroughly that I go on walks with Hedgehog in it to get him to sleep.

But I've done all this in spite of, not because of, Harvey and the models. Whatever they have taught me was, for a while, anyway, entirely invisible over the rubble of what was once my fatherly self-esteem.

So, people who make instructional videos for infant-related products and activities, please heed these simple suggestions:

1. Show actual babies. Under no circumstances are you to use dolls.
2. Don't have your models smile so damn much. A look of concentration would be nice, since that's the look I've got on my face. The smile is a form of taunting...a "Look how easy this is for me!" face. By the way, Beco and Moby people...dads wear these things too. A token male or two would help a lot--I wouldn't feel like I'm crashing some estrogen-and-nitrous-oxide party.
3. Do not drug the babies before putting them on camera, nor take them directly out of milk-coma naps. Show what it looks like to put in a baby who is actually struggling against the parents' wishes, as almost all surely will struggle at first.

And finally, most importantly,

4. Show failures. Show people who did NOT manage to get their babies into the carrier or who did NOT manage to get their babies swaddled or to sleep. Explain what they're doing wrong. Troubleshoot. Because without this step, I am left with absolutely no idea what I'm doing wrong, and will have to head to the store where I can ask an actual human being actual questions. More importantly, without this step, I will feel like a complete spaz and an inadequate parent, and I will blame you.

Please feel free to contact me with any questions. I am available to critique your next video before you make some other dad feel like a moron.

But until then, I hate you.

All the best,

TRP

State Memories Project: Minnesota

2009-06-08T21:08:00.000-07:00

The HHH Metrodome served as the first major league ballpark on 1993's Love and Baseball Stadium Tour. Mostly to anesthetize myself from the pain of a recent breakup, I decided I’d drive to 11 different major league ballparks and sleep on (mostly female, often romantic-interest) friends’ floors. I got started that afternoon at a fairly crappy indoor ballpark. The game was quite good—Oakland beat Minnesota 8-7, coming back from a 5-0 deficit to do so. Twin Shane Mack had two homers.

My seat was on an aisle in the second row, shaded just a tiny notch to the third-base side of home plate--just a few feet behind the Twins’ on-deck circle. When one buys single seats to meaningless games well in advance, one often gets very, very lucky.

I had my glove on, hoping for a foul ball. And I stayed alert…except once. Between innings…the 6th or so, I don’t remember exactly--there was a pitching change. I filled in my scorecard with the stats of the outgoing pitcher, focusing hard, when…BAM! I jerked my neck up. Something hit the side of my seat.

It was a ball. I guess there was either an errant throw in infield warmups or (more likely) a player decided to toss one into the stands as a souvenir. But I was so carefully doing my stats that I didn’t see it coming. I’m fortunate it didn’t hit me in the head. As it is, I’m not even sure where it wound up. It must have ricocheted across the aisle to someone in the next section.

In spite of that misadventure, I still score every game I’ve been to.

Letter to Hedgehog: Month Three

2009-05-31T21:33:00.000-07:00

Dear Hedgehog,

We had a wonderful month, and it ended with you being baptized today. Family and friends came from all around to party with you. And early returns indicate you enjoy parties. Like your dad (and NOT like your mom), you seem to enjoy being the center of attention. Today was a great day for that. We played "Pass The Baby" all day long. When the minister took you up and down the aisle at the church, everybody waved and made faces. You're a really, really cool guy and get along nicely with everyone.

You're gathering skills at a simply mind-boggling rate. It just blows my mind, the human brain and watching you develop yours. Last week (and for all weeks prior), you would just stare up and the fish on your mobile...maybe swat at them a little. Within the last few days, you figured out you could grab them. Yesterday, you even pulled one right off its velcro mooring. I notice you reaching out for the books I read you and even following them around when I move them around. It's simply an awesome experience, in both the modern sense of the word (i.e., "cool") and the traditional sense of the word (i.e. "inspiring awe and wonderment").

Yesterday, your 14-year-old cousin decided to lay down next to you and play with a baby cell phone your grandparents had gotten you. It's a little advanced for you as yet, but when your cousin sat there and smacked the buttons in a game he invented (which sounded challenging), you were absolutely transfixed. I think you focus a LOT on kids when they're around. Not so much on babies, but on kids who can do more than you can. That's a hell of a good way to learn.

And I'll keep busting my butt for you if you keep on smiling at us whenever you can. It still feels sort of unreal. I'd imagine it always will. I should ask my parents about that. Their oldest turned 45 today. I bet it still feels unreal to them in some ways. Because when I'm singing to you or reading to you or just chilling with you, I continue to think this when I look at you:

"Whoa! I helped make THAT????"

Talk to you in another month.

State Memories Project: Michigan

2009-05-31T21:03:00.000-07:00

This particular memory comes from a rite of passage in our family. At age 10, each of us—my siblings and me--got to fly to Detroit…alone!...to spend a week or ten days with Aunt Sally (mom’s kid sister) and Uncle Fred. I therefore headed out there in August of 1980, and remember loads from that trip—Bablo Island amusement park, Greenwood Village, hanging out endlessly with my cousin Joe, and my first major league game (Tigers 8, Red Sox 7…a game that ended at 12:50 AM due to a huge rain delay).

In the middle of that 10-year-old trip, we headed up to Caseville, a town at the tip of the thumb where my Grandpa Joe, who had died the previous year, had a cottage a long block from Lake Huron. My cousin, me, Aunt Sally, Uncle Fred, and maybe a couple of others had gone up there with some neighbors of Sally and Fred’s who had a daughter named Beth about my age and a son a little younger whose name I have since forgotten.

The four of us kids had headed down to the beach for the last bit of daylight, walking the five or six houses west-bound (I remember it as about a hundred yards) to the water. Once there, we saw an absolutely flat-out gorgeous sunset--a bright, vivid, very dark red sun in a perfect circle hanging a little ways above the water. We were all between 7 and 10 years old, but we were absolutely awe-struck by the sight, loudly shouting “Whoa! Wow!” a few times.

I’m not sure why, but it occurred to me that the adults needed to see this sunset. My companions agreed.

So we all ran as fast as we could off of the beach and up the road to the cottage, where we ran in and shouted at the two couples that there was an incredible sunset that they needed to see and that they had to get out there NOW because the sun was going down and they’d miss it. (Because of trees and houses, the sunset was invisible from the cottage; one had to walk to the beach to see it.)

We did everything we could to impart this sense of urgency to Aunt Sally, Uncle Fred, and their neighbors, but much to my dismay, I remember them lollygagging a little, getting on shoes, etc. At every moment of the way, the four of us shouted “Hurry up! It’s going down! Hurry!” And at every moment, the adults would not comply. Even when we were out on the road, we were running ahead of them a little, then turning around to gesticulate and tell them to run, hurry, they’d miss it--yet they were still not compliant. They walked very, very slowly and engaged in stupid adult conversation instead. They didn’t understand the urgency.

I saw the last of the bright-dark-red sunset through the trees, but when we got to the clearing, the sun—and the sunset—was gone. We tried to describe it, and said “Couldn’t you see a little of it through the trees?”

“That? Oh! I thought that was a light!” said the neighbor mom.

I remember feeling exasperated that I’d tried to share this beautiful thing with others, and they didn’t seem to understand its beauty or importance until too late.

State Memories Project: Massachusetts

2009-05-25T19:06:00.000-07:00

About three weeks after my own wedding, Swankette’s maid of honor was married in Boston. We flew out, hung out with them and their friends, and had a generally great time hanging out with cool people. Swankette reciprocated as maid of honor for her friend, and everything went fabulously...Swankette looking hot in her outfit, giving a beautiful speech or two, happy people singing and performing at the reception...it was the garden variety joyful wedding.

It was similar, and it was, of course, a little different, because it was my first gay wedding, and barely a year after Massachusetts had legalized same-sex marriage, was still a fairly new thing.

My single memory of that weekend is of the wonderful rabbi, who somehow wove together the ordinariness and the extraordinariness of what we were all there to celebrate. I wish I had his exact words, but here’s what he said as best as I could remember:

“In the middle of all of this joy, we can’t forget that what we’re doing is unquestionably a political act.”

I remember feeling like marrying someone you loved shouldn’t have to be a political act or an act of courage. I remember feeling like the wonderful moment here wasn’t any different or any less important than the wonderful moment Swankette and I had had a few weeks earlier. But I remember being grateful that the rabbi didn’t neglect either the commonness or the extraordinariness of what was happening--neither the sameness nor the difference this ceremony bore towards my own recent wedding. He got that complexity, and it helped to clarify what was on my mind as I watched my wife stand next to her best friend, one of two brides. I won’t forget how he pulled that off.

Western Conference Finals, Lakers vs. Nuggets

2009-05-25T18:32:00.000-07:00

I just saw Denver is up by 7 early on the Lakers. I watched a good amount of Game 3--sort of caught Nuggets Fever again due to the media. But, as always when I watch the NBA, I tired quickly of motionless offenses. I DO NOT WANT TO WATCH THE BEST ATHLETES IN THE WORLD STAND STILL. Please, SOMEBODY move away from the ball!

But that's not what this is about. It's about a statement I heard that the Game 2 victory for Denver was their first playoff victory over the Lakers since 1985.

My mind went back to the 84/85 Nuggets as if to an old crush. That's the first team that I honestly, totally, 100% fell in love with. And nothing's been the same since.

Sure, I liked the Nuggets equally-good teams of the late '70s--these were my first-ever pro sports events. But I was only 7 or 8...not enough to REALLY understand what it means to commit to a team. At 15, I got it.

Denver had traded Kiki Vandeweghe to Portland in the off-season and acquired Calvin Natt, Fat Lever, and Wayne Cooper in return. Dan Issel, who was going to hang it up at the end of the year, was a bench player. And Doug Moe, the coach, was still running his players like hell (an earlier Doug Moe version of the Nuggets had set records for most points scored AND most points against...128.7 and 128.0, if I remember correctly). So the games were ADD eye candy...constant set-ups and shots. Alex English, the NBA's top scorer of the 1980s (look it up! it's true!) was a silky mid-range jumper guy (who the hell is his current NBA equivalent? I can't think of any either). And T.R. Dunn would come out to stop the opponents' #1 guard--but Moe had ordered him to never, ever shoot.

The team got out to a good start--they were 11-2 at one point--and won the division quite handily. Dad and I jumped on the phone for playoff tickets as soon as they were available, buying game 2 tickets since they sold out sooner. And we watched the Nuggets LOSE to the Spurs by two in the 2-7 matchup.

Great! But we came back around and won the series in 5 (the first round was a best-of-5 in those days...as all series should be now, possibly excepting the Finals).

We put away the Jazz 4-1 in the second round (I was present for an overtime win in Game 2...which I can't remember anything about these years later) which set up the Western Conference Final. Nuggets and Lakers.

Remember: The 1985 Lakers were the absolute zenith of Showtime. I'd rank it as the #1 single-year team of the decade...I wonder if the experts would agree. Magic was at his peak, Kareem was still an honest threat, James Worthy had developed into the real deal, Bob McAdoo off the bench, Michael Cooper, Jamaal Wilkes, Kurt Rambis...hell of a team.

Dad and I bought tickets for game 4. I hoped we could poach a game in LA and ride out a 6-game series in the altitude at home.

We lost game 1 by 17. Game 2 was a late-night affair, starting at 9:00 Mountain on a Tuesday night. Parents would not permit me to stay up to watch the second half.

I was PISSED. Pissed until, alas, I went to school the next day and found nobody else had been allowed to watch the game. I also learned that, when he saw how special Game 2 turned out to be, he thought of waking me up to see the end.

I did watch the third quarter over my breakfast.

The Nuggets SLAUGHTERED the Lakers. In the Forum. They couldn't put anything together.

Our white stiff backup center, Danny Schayes, muscled Kareem into losing his cool and getting into a huge fight in the fourth quarter. Both were ejected. I remember him trying to gouge Schayes' eye out while saying "How does it feel to have your eye gouged out?"

I kinda wish they'd suspended both players for a game--that'd have been awesome for the Nuggets. But they didn't. While I listened on the radio from my grandparents' house in the mountains, I heard the Lakers win game 3 handily in Denver. We needed--NEEDED game 4.

The game I was headed to.

Here's what I remember. It was close throughout. There were signs under every seat that said "BEAT L.A." When they played Gary Glitter's "Rock and Roll Part Two" ("Don't worry, you'll recognize it," said the directions on the back of the card), we were to shout "Hey! Beat L.A!" in the part where Gary shouted "Hey!" It sort of worked. It was DAMN LOUD. And we improvised, just chanting "BEAT L A! BEAT L A!" to the beat during the "verses" of the song (if you could call them that).

I don't remember the specifics, but Denver was down by 2, or maybe 4, late, when we popped back to a tie with a couple of buckets. 116-116. One minute on the clock. (Or was it 59 seconds? What I think I remember and what is true may be different here.) The L.A. time out...the sound never went down the whole time. I just wanted that one damn win at home.

L.A. came back out and scored. If I remember right, it was a damn skyhook.

Denver ran RIGHT down the floor. A pass, a pass, and Danny Freakin' Schayes had a step on Kareem! He's going to score on the break!

The ball bounced off of his hands and out of bounds.

Shit.

L.A. scored again, and we didn't. Final: Lakers 120, Nuggets 116.

"I just don't want this to be the way Issel's career ends!" I said.

(I knew damn well we wouldn't win Game 5.)

Issel did get a last hurrah. In the 44-point loss in Game 5 to end the series, Moe sent him back out for a goodbye stretch, and Issel hit a 3 in his career's final shot. I wish we had that to remember him by rather than his losing his cool and attacking a fan in the racially-based tirade that ended his coaching career. But, playing-wise, it turned out OK.

Denver never made it back to the conference finals until this year...when we lost game 1 and won game 2 in L.A.

And it feels familiar to me. The nostalgia was enough to drive me to watch game 3.

Go Nuggets.

Hawker bloopers

2009-05-24T21:59:00.000-07:00

At the Mariner game today, a hawker was selling both Dibs ice cream and Mike's Hard Lemonade.

Let us set aside the strangeness of the same hawker selling kid snacks and adult beverages. I guess they have a limited number of portable receptacles that keep things very cold.

What was strange--and disturbing--is that the guy kept shouting this (and, with apologies to Dave Barry, I am not making this up):

"Mike's Hard! I've got Dibs!"
"Mike's Hard! I've got Dibs!"
"Mike's Hard! I've got Dibs!"

Wife and I were, to my knowledge, the only people doing the Beavis and Butt-head laugh at all of that.

Really, really funny.

2009-05-17T09:28:00.001-07:00

This went viral a little while ago, so you've probably already seen it. But it has given me the giggles at random times over the past week or so since I first heard it.

WARNING: The jingle is so catchy that you'll probably be caught singing it somewhere marginally appropriate.

State Memories Project: Maryland

2009-05-17T09:19:00.000-07:00

All of my Maryland trips have had sports in them—two Orioles games, one Aberdeen IronBirds game, and a Washington Bullets game. The latter was on my first trip to Maryland, and is my best Maryland memory.

This was April of 1995. I was wrapping up my time at Pittsburgh, and somehow had a weekend to burn. My buddy Rob (see Arizona) was getting a graduate degree at Penn State, and we met up and headed down to Rockville, Maryland, where former Kenyon College Chaser-mate Alison lived with her boyfriend (now husband) Joe. We found their place and hung out for a couple of days.

Included in the itinerary that weekend was a trip to see the Washington Bullets play and their then-home in Landover, Maryland. A quick Google search reveals that we saw them play Phoenix and lose 127-123. Rob, Alison, Joe and I mostly sat back and made snarky comments. This is back when I would yell stuff for fun. And for some reason, we noticed the Bullets’ cheerleaders, about 20 rows beneath us on the floor by the corner of the court, were responding to some of the dorky things we were yelling.

Rob said: “I bet we could get them to join in a cheer we start.”

So, next time Washington had the ball, we tried.

“LET’S GO, BUL-LETS! (clap, clap...clap-clap)
LET’S GO, BUL-LETS! (clap, clap...clap-clap)”

By the end of our second repeat, the cheerleaders were saying it with us. We stopped chanting and started high-fiving. Yeah! We did it!

About a second later, Rob started a second chant:

“WE LOVE THE CHEER-LEADERS! (clap, clap…clap-clap)”

They laughed. And Rob later suggested we could have bedded the whole cheerleading squad due to our hilarious wit. It's a shame we didn't try.

What do y'all have for Maryland?

This just occurred to me.

2009-05-16T22:38:00.000-07:00

I've been singing a lot of John Lennon lately because I've convinced myself, based on a very small sample size, that it helps my son sleep.

Alas, as I've stated here (and am too lazy to link to), Paul Simon's songs to children are superior. In fact, the only song Lennon wrote for a kid is "Beautiful Boy."

Yeah. I'm not a fan either. I usually sing "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds." Done right, it's a sweet little fantasy. (Yeah, I know people say it's about LSD. But let's go with Lennon's story that it's about a picture his son made.)

It occurred to me, however, that John Lennon hasn't even written the best song to his own child.

Lennon's song to his son: "Beautiful Boy."
Paul McCartney's song to Lennon's son: "Hey Jude."

That's such a blowout that we need the mercy rule.