I'd like to respond to The Boy's particularly pithy comment, in response to Friday's post.

First of all, it's a fantastic comment, because
a) It uses the phrase "Whoa whoa whoa Miss Lippy."
b) It calls attention to an embarassing moment that I had left out of my recap (i.e. "nights you're planning on losing your wallet and cell phone")
c) Because of b), it insults me. Or, pokes fun at me, anyway.

So, basically, it was a real nice gesture on the part of The Boy to leave money on the table before he left on Thursday morning. I can be forgiven, I think, for assuming that the money was from my dad, and not from The Boy; after all, my dad generally leaves with a 20-dollar handshake when I see him. Combine it with the fact that the twenty bucks were left under a CD of my older brother's that I had expressly asked for from my dad, and I figured both items came from him. They didn't, apparently.

Also, I never meant that The Boy "stole" the wine because, after all, I suggested that he do it. Kid's gotta stop being so defensive, eh?

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Further disclosure from ASGADOAPBN, which was an epic-ly great time for me, I think:

a) There exists cell phone video footage of me belting out, and I mean belting out, "Since U Been Gone." It's low-quality footage, but it's definitely me. I do not remember this portion of the festivities.
b) I went swimming before leaving. I only vaguely remember swimming.
c) I lost my wallet, though it was found the next morning. It slid out of my shorts and onto the chair I was using as we sat around the on-beach bonfire. (Sweet.) It was returned to me at work immediately the next morning.
d) I also lost my cell phone, which is a scary, scary thing. The cell phone turned up the next afternoon, underneath the passenger seat of the yellow car. It is apparently undamaged and fully-functional.
e) I stopped by the host's home after work on Thursday to let her know that I had found the cell phone. (She had left work early Thursday, and resolved to check through the boats and the house for it.) I also stopped by to pick up the cooler that The Boy and I had brought over. As I was leaving the house, her dad came out with the shirt I had worn to their house for ASGADOAPBN: "Is this your shirt?" he asked. "I guess so." No, I do not remember leaving my shirt there.
f) It was a pretty great time.
g) Had Rico been there, I probably would have said "I exist to entertain you" a whole lot.

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I was making some phone calls earlier this week, because I'm in need of auto insurance. (I've been driving with expired out-of-state license plates since I arrived here, and my out-of-state auto insurance officially expired on Tuesday.) Sadly, I can't register my car here without proof of insurance, so this prolonged the car registration process. (It also, however, forces me to comply with the law, which is probably a good thing.)

So I filled out an online thing to get a whole bunch of quotes from area insurers, and then started to call some local brokers who are also sponsors of the team. I then called a few non-sponsors. All told, I probably made six or eight or ten inquiries, which I think means that I'm being a pretty responsible consumer.

About the fourth call, I was going through my information with the agent - name, local address, driver's license number, vehicle identification number, and the like. So, we're going through the process, and she stops, and says, "Hey, do you work for the ballclub?" "Yeah, I do." "I thought I recognized your name." "How'd you know?" "Oh, I like to listen to the games when I'm not at the ballpark." "Wow! Well, gee, thanks, that's so nice."

And we go on and on and on from there, and it was pretty neat.

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I got to talk to Didi for about an hour last night. It was fantastic. Less than a year to D-Day, or M-Day, or W-Day. Woof!

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One of the frustrating aspects of working for this club is that so few of the players have actual futures in baseball, outside of continuing to toil in this league. Compare this to my time in A-Ball, where, in four years, I probably saw 50 or more players that have already played in the big leagues.

Dontrelle Willis is obviously a star at this point, and Joe Blanton and Danny Haren are on the way, it seems. Brent Clevlen had an incredibly awesome first week in the bigs for Detroit, and Shin-Soo Choo has done the same, now with Cleveland. It seems like the entire Cubs rotation - Juan Mateo, Carlos Marmol, Rich Hill, Angel Guzman, Sean Marshall - overlapped with me while they were in Lansing, as did the guys they traded for Juan Pierre - Ricky Nolasco, Sergio Mitre, and Renyel Pinto. I saw six of the eight pitch between 2002 and 2004. (Guzman and Marshall were early-season promotions, so I don't think I ever saw them.)

(As I write this list, off the top of my head, I see that the number to at least make the big leagues is far more than 50. I've just named six Cubs pitchers, for chrissakes.)

Even guys who stunk in the Midwest League are suddenly big league contributors - check out the numbers of Seattle reliever Mark Lowe, whose ERA in A-ball last season was greater than five.

Meanwhile, my league has sent 12 or 13 or 14 players to the big leagues in a decade.

That's frustrating.

Why does this come up? Because Joe Mauer is on the freakin' cover of Sports Illustrated this week. And because Twins reliever Pat Neshek has the greatest blog of all time. (Of particular awesomeness is his post from July 8th, because that's when he got the Big League call.) Point is, I watched both of these guys in their first full pro seasons. I do miss that.

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It's been far too long, so I've updated some of the songs at right. I've been listening to a lot of music lately, owing to the fact that I've been running a lot. I realized that I really, really love the first two Strokes albums. (The third one isn't bad, either.) Listening today, I also realized that I'd really love Spoon if I listened more. I guess that's it.

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WIDiRVoFOW
(A bit of a stretch, really, because it's less "why he sucks" and more "why he sucks at broadcasting," which is also significant because he's also my boss)

This Week's Reason:
His ridiculous use of bad baseball cliches.

Examples:
- "He just always seems to be coming to the plate with runners on base."
- "How often does a guy make a great defensive play, then lead off the next inning?" (And he said it with tongue firmly not-planted in cheek.)

I can't think of any other ones he uses.

What Makes It Worse:
Sometimes he ropes me into his ridiculous cliches. "How often do we say it: 'It's not how hard you hit it, it's where you put it that matters.'" My [unspoken] response: "I've never said it, jackass."

I swear, I'll come up with a good one next week. After all, he's back in town on Friday, and I'm sure there'll be a new bout of whininess.