just a note that i've updated the song listings (see lower part of menu bar) to reflect what i've been listening to lately. a new listing will probably come out in mid-august...i went about 2 1/2 months before the current update.

perhaps the upset selection is the white stripes' "i want to be the boy to warm your mother's heart" as my chosen selection from the powerhouse elephant. i chose it because it's my favorite song on the album, followed by "there's no home for you here," "girl, you have no faith in medicine," "i just don't know what to do with myself," and "hypnotize."

i don't know what their second single is. "seven nation army" was a fine first single.

let me tell you about grand rapids, michigan, the town that i've been in since sunday night.

from what i can tell, grand rapids, which is the second-largest town in the state of michigan, is a real nice place.

i'm staying at the days inn, which is near some swanky hotel as well as a less swanky hotel, a short walk across one of two bridges into downtown. downtown has this real nice music stage which, sadly, was not active tonight. beginning in june, wednesday is outdoor blues night in grand rapids.

i've sampled two local eateries, as well as two chains, while here.

blake's turkey sandwich shoppe grades as a b. the wheat bread wasn't dark enough for my tastes, and the service of the counter guy was a bit condescending (the menu is a bit confusing...they've got condiments listed in two different places...different condiments...so he thought i meant 'everything' from one section, and i meant 'everything from the other section...and then he gave me a look when i was confused...as it turns out, i didn't get the avocado that i had hoped for.) but the sandwich was really good (as was the fruit cup...i'm on company money, so i can afford fruit cups), and the real carved turkey was all thick and yummy.

the dog pit grades as a b-minus. i expected a standard short-order place but, as it turns out, it's strictly a hot dog stand. the major flaw was their chicago style hot dog. (as we all know, a chicago style hot dog features the following condiments: mustard, relish, dill pickle, sport peppers, tomato, onion, celery salt. it's wonderful.) their definition of a chicago style hot dog: catsup, mustard, relish, tomato, onion, celery salt, chili. this clearly is not a chicago style hot dog (they've omitted the dill pickle and peppers, while adding the chili and ketchup). i was so offended by the catsup mistake (i did order the chicago style hotdog, minus the ketchup) that i didn't notice the chili anyway, i had the chicago style dog and the junkyard dog (chili, cheese, catsup, mustard, kraut, tabasco, perhaps onions...). they were yummy, and i've got indigestion! also, bonus points for the bottled beverages on hand - glass bottles of grape crush and ibc root beer and my choice, ibc cherry limeade (a success on my first sampling), and double bonus points for the empty bottle boxes next to the garbage cans...cans are worth 10 cents in the great state of michigan.

i also ate at t.g.i. friday's, where the friday's three-for-all and miller lite tasted the same as they always do, and the local burger king, which was out of barbeque sauce and dollar bills. i also drank last night at sully's sports bar in the days inn, which is pretty bad, but (see yesterday's entry) was also free.

anyway, i think grand rapids, michigan, is a place where i wouldn't mind living. it's a good smallish town.

idea: the finest way to impress your middle-aged african-american friends while in a bar...

a very simple thing to say: "any jukebox that doesn't have stevie wonder's songs in the key of life doesn't even deserve to be called a jukebox at all." (in some situations, you can say "marvin gaye's what's going on")

i tried it tonight, and i drank for free. that's all.

i've not really had the chance to really follow much of the glenbrook north hazing thing, although i've noticed it sure is wild and i sort of wish that i was still in high school so that i could go to glenbrook south-glenbrook north games and engage in cheers such as "sal-mon whack-ers (clap, clap, clapclapclap)" or "pig in-tes-tines (clap, clap, clapclapclap)" or yell mildly offensive things such as "why don't you go get drunk and throw poop at each other!?!"

anyway, i found out today my true connection to the event. (my only previous connection was having a sister who went to middle school with one of the senior girls, a pretty strong connection indeed.) apparently, it turns out that the home at which the junior girls got liquored up before getting beaten up was the same home where i attended a post-fifth grade graduation pool party. (younger sister of my classmate is apparently one of the junior girls. mother of junior [her name, mary spiwak, is public] did not purchase the beer, but did offer a venue for its consumption.)

apparently, mom and junior girl are also interviewed in the current edition of people of some other publication, discussing the injustices or the horror of the whole ordeal or something. go field middle school.

i think i can safely consider myself a fringe celebrity with a connection like this.

remember when you were like seven, and somebody would fart, and then somebody would say 'ewww' and everyone would cover their noses?

(disclaimer: i was never a nose-cover-er.)

at what point do you get over the nose-covering? i can understand saying 'ewww' or saying 'who did that' or implicating somebody immediately and throwing garbage at them, but the nose-covering, i just don't get.

there's this guy, like 22 years old, and he covers his nose. it just doesn't make sense.

quiet, productive (a bit), rare off day. spent no less than two hours outside, at the park, laying on the grass, reading. a bit weird, i guess, but very relaxing. i do, however, feel quite lame being early-twenties and completely and utterly engrossed in high fidelity. i mean, i'm not supposed to be identifying with him yet, right?

is it okay to be angry with getting calls from work on your off day? i'm not sure. but the two phone calls i received (and the one i had to make as a result) ruined a near-perfect afternoon. perhaps i'm alone in valuing my time off like i do.

prior to park-time, i got a haircut that, upon completion, i thought was a 'bad' haircut. (on further inspection, it seems okay. short enough to last me until next month.) i would have given terry the 'can you take a bit more off the top?' treatment, but there was a four-year-old in a bitchin' spiderman t-shirt that was next in line, and i would have felt guilty for making him wait. he clearly had the jitters.

eight-game road trip starts tomorrow. fort wayne and then grand rapids. the tour of the great midwest continues.

(p.s. one of the specialties at the grand rapids concession stands? the deep-fried twinkie.)

two new songs from the forthcoming guided by voices release, earthquake glue, are now available for download.

they seem just alright. "i'll replace you with machines" is a cooler title than a song and is available at gbv.com.

"my kind of soldier" is a fairly poppy, mid-tempo composition recorded with steve albini, essentially on a whim. conceived, written, recorded within two days, and now it'll be the 'single' for the record. it's availble at the matador records site.

i guess it's notable that the man's like 45 years old and still creating rock music, but i'd consider these songs, on early listening, a step down. they're nice ("soldier" moreso than "machines"), but they're not clutch-you-by-the-testicles-and-not-let-go (in a good way) nice like "over the neptune" or "pendulum" or "as we go up we go down" or "the finest joke is upon us" or "chasing heather crazy." i'll reserve judgment, of course, as the record's not out until mid-august (and therefore not due for leaking until mid-july.)

sunday nights are generally 'chores and phone' nights for me. 'chores,' in weeks in which there is an off day and therefore an opportunity to cook dinner, often includes a trip to the grocery store. not just osco, but the real grocery store.

today, i did need to purchase some cereal, and i was about to go purchase my old standby, coco dyno-bites (see related recipe here!), when i noticed something truly wonderful: apparently riding the coattails of last year's phenomenal promotion, post cereals has brought back its major league baseball mini-bobblehead. of course, i chose to purchase the brand name product, fruity pebbles in this case, therefore continuing last year's disturbing trend in which i actually purchase the box of cereal exclusively for the toy inside.

i got jason giambi. bullshit. (expletive not deleted. i'm pissed.)

in other news, i purchased the decemberists' castaways and cutouts, owing to its frequent comparisons to the great neutral milk hotel. the album's opening stanza: "my name is leslie anne levine / my mother birthed me down a dry ravine / my mother birthed me far too soon / born at nine and dead at noon" (italics reprinted from lyric booklet). i'm not expecting mangum, but that certainly is mangumesque.

bus story two: trainer doing crossword puzzle today. he says "'kind of bean' ends with an 'a'. it's not lima." i say 'fava.'

trainer gets angry at me for some reason, i'm not quite sure, before discounting the mere possibility that it could be fava. (at which point i'm thinking, are there really any other four-letter beans that end in an 'a'.)

at this point, floyd interjects: "if it's fava i'll (expletive deleted) on the floor." to which i say "i'm holding you to that."

flash forward three or four minutes, when trainer says "joseph conrad novella." to which i say, without hesitation, "heart of darkness." to which he says, "heart. of. da.....i think it is."

flash forward 30 seconds, when trainer says, "oh (expletive deleted), i think it is fava." to which i giggle.

to which floyd says, "i'm working on those turds." and then i went to sleep.

a nickname was bestowed upon me today. i'm not sure what to think about it, but i don't think it'll stick.

as my man floyd rayford stepped on the bus post-ugly loss, he said "...andrew...the horse." to which i said, "the horse?" to which he said, "the horse...your laugh, H-yah, H-yah" because i sometimes do that odd slightly over-loud laugh.

the previous nickname? casper, in reference to my tan.

i got to thinking today that i'm lucky i have limited free time or social life because, if i did, the well of new-music-listened-to would severely dry up. i'm on about my biggest music-buying kick since the days of serving as the friendly, long-haired record store clerk at evanston's second-finest music behemoth.

this past weekend saw me make no fewer than two trips to davenport's finest (service-, selection-wise) or second-finest (price-wise, by about a buck a disc), depending on your perspective, music retail behemoth. saturday saw the purchase of the new pornographers' electric version, while sunday saw the purchase of in the aeroplane over the sea, i believe a sixth-time purchase. on sunday, i also ordered the decemberists' castaways and cutouts (or is it the other way around?), owing to the fact that davenport's finest music behemoth had sold its only copy. i've also recently purchased uncle tupelo's no depression reissue, along with records by the streets, the white stripes, and senor dylan. again, good thing i don't have a social life!

tangentially, as i'm spending all this unnecessary money on music, i'm wondering if i'm the only person who appreciates a well-constructed album, and by album, i mean everything, which includes artwork and packaging and things like that, anymore. because, to me, its the having of the record that's cool. because, i've done the downloading thing and (even if i did have a burner) i just don't think it does it for me. i mean, seriously, dig the artwork for elephant and tell me that it doesn't improve the record. what a freakin' package.

that's all.

so today brought our second straight cancellation of a ballgame, this one perhaps more legit than last night (when, despite scary freakin' forecasts, we got a major storm from 830-945, and clearly would have been able to play after waiting it out). this one was cancelled due to rain forecasts (which proved incorrect) and winds with gusts of up to 40 mph.

this morning, after the cancellation was decided, we had to remove the water from overnight from the tarp, and then put the tarp back on the field in preparation for further rain. this is standard operating procedure, and a bit of a workout. anyway, tarp pull begins at the third base foul line and concludes at the right field warning track. that's the plan anyway.

so we begin the tarp pull from third base, carrying toward the baseline between first and second. upon arriving at the beginning of the outfield grass, a gust - - a big 'ol gust - - comes from foul territory on the first base side. the gust essentially inflates the tarp, in the process lifting no fewer than seven of us off the ground.

it was at that point that i determined that i have the greatest job in the world.

much of my social life consists of phone calls which, while ridiculous and a bit pathetic, also speaks wonders about the quality of friendships that i've formed...wonderful people with whom i'd like to maintain a significant amount of contact for a significant amount of time.

tonight featured conversations with five of my best friends in the world...four of these met through wonderful northwestern and one more from wonderful glenbrook south, as well as phone messages left for another gbs pal and another nu pal. which perhaps makes me seem lame.

but it's late, and i'm not going to get the sleep that i'd hoped for (tomorrow we've got a ridiculous doubleheader...as it turns out, we could have easily played tonight...), and i'm not at all upset by this.

so, if you helped to fulfill my life (a life which probably included about four hours on the phone this evening), i wish to thank you heartily.

sometimes it happens, and when it does, it's always good. i've found myself on a 'gbv kick,' which basically means that i'm being guided by the voice of robert pollard. there's not much better than that. pacing the apartment, singing in my faux british accent 'senator sipping on gentleman jack' or 'proud brothers...do not fret...the bus will get you there yet' or 'decide now before you continue. the list is complete without your permission' and it's all so random but so wonderful. and you (or me, anyway) realize that, occassionally, contenders will emerge or new trends will have me singing neo-soul or british rap or the latest synthesized orchestra but when it's all said and it's all done, the last one standing will be the fading captain.

ahhh...how sweet it is.

how does one deal with this?


i was at a meeting with the club's lame-ass internet service provider, a company that's been lax-and-a-half in getting our redesigned website (launch date: march 15) up and running.


anyway, an earlier incarnation of the website had featured a player diary feature, for which i would conduct an interview and ghost-write a diary entry. conversation segued (thanks to web designer) into a monologue about adapting this now-unused section into a blog-type format. this led to a super-monologue, by internet service provider owner, on the ridiculousness of the blog...


here's the question: is there anything more humbling than the internet service provider guy making fun of you? answer: nope. color me humbled.


spoke with melissa today. she's a wonderful person. the question is, how can two people who share absolutely zero common interests date for two years? (me: baseball rules. her: baseball's boring. her: opera rules. me: opera seriously does not rule. me: i like gbv. her: i like jim croce.) makes no sense. it'll never make sense.


happy it happened: i'm significanly richer of experience and poorer of pocketbook because of that time of my life.

sometimes you forget how seriously these ballplayers take their careers. after all, they're low minor leagues, with slim to none chances of making the big leagues (about 2 per 25 will actually make it...)

story from today: fifth inning. one of the team leaders hits shot to right field. he thinks it's gone. wind gusting in. he apparently doesn't hustle to first, anticipating a home run trot (i'm watching ball/fielder, and don't see this). ball is caught at warning track, as player reaches first base. ballplayer is pulled from lineup.

flash forward 2 hours, to post-game bus.

ballplayer is fuming. pissed. loudly complaining. arguing with hitting coach (not the manager, who made the decision. this confrontation does not occur.). cursing out the crappy freakin' twins for keeping him in low-a. talking about ways to piss off the major league brass to earn his release. hitting coach: "ain't no way they're letting you go." ballplayer: "f*ck 'em." hitting coach: "you ain't getting out of the contract. you're p-r-o-p-e-r-t-y." ballplayer: "a piece of f*ckin' meat."

an interesting interaction, that's all.

postscript: team was up 4-1 when flyout happened. team lost 5-4 in 12 innings.

BONUS!

It's 3:30. We've just gotten into South Bend. I needed to do a bit of work, so I treated myself to a beverage from the coke machine down the hall.

My decision? Not Coke brand water, not Sprite, not Cherry Coke...for the first time in...well, probably three years...I choose Fanta.

And it tastes a bit weird.

but here's the BONUS! : I check under the bottle cap, and ... free fanta!

life. is. good.