Pardon me while I begin my seasonal affective disorder

“It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops."   ~A. Bartlett Giamatti

The Poetry of Baseball

It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops." ― A. Bartlett Giamatti

My Giants Win the World Series - but still....

It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops. - Bart Giamatti

Confession Tuesday - Fall Ball edition

Tuesday night and you have one beat confessor here... Let's go to the confessional.

Dear Reader~  It's been a week since my last confession.  It's been a year since I was pinching myself over my San Francisco Giants making it to the World Series.  Sadly they did not make it this year but their winning it all last year was sweet and I confess that I still have to pinch myself over their post season success!  Seasons like 2010 provide true baseball fans a lifetime of memories.

The World Series this year kicks off tomorrow night and I will be rooting for the St. Louis Cardinals. I confess that I have no love to give for the Rangers,  besides in most instances with few exceptions I would root for a National League team.


My night has been no less hectic then my day. Left the office a little late.  Picked up my niece and drove her back to our neighborhood to do a job interview.  Then we ran to the store to shop for groceries. Home, fixed dinner for my wife (who worked late) and then drove back into the city to pick her up and return home.  Re-heated dinner and then here I am.  10:30 p.m. already!  I have work plans for tonight but at this hour I confess I have nothing more to give. I'm fighting to finish this confession.

I confess that each year I play a video season of baseball.  A full season. Sometimes I'll play a second season over winter. I've become quite good at it. I suppose it's the kid in me. There is a lot of kid factor in all aspects of baseball. Yes, I'll confess that it's a frivolous activity. Still, I kind of feel like it keeps me sharp. It's my story and I'm sticking to it!

Go Cardinals!



Black and Orange October! Game 2 All San Francisco

Giants pitching shuts out Rangers - who give up 9 runs - 8 eight of which came in 7th inning and beyond.

2 -0 lead by the Giants in World Series

Orange October!

The San Francisco Giants defeated the Phillies 3-2 tonight to become the 2010 National League Champions.

This team of unlikelies is far from some of the power teams the Giants have put together in the past.  It won so many games by 1 and 2 run margins that many have called Giants baseball this season Torture Ball.

The team only remotely resembles the team that broke camp at the end of spring training. Players have been shifted around the field and others acquired as the season went on. Players like Pat Burrell who was cut from another team mid season and thought he would be watching the rest of the season from home, but the Giants were interested and he became a great fit and was one of many players that kept the team competitive down the stretch.

These players have played their hearts out to get to this point and it would be so incredible to see them win it all in the World Series. I've cheered the Giants through the 1989 Quake Series they lost to Oakland and the 2002 California Series vs Anaheim that they heartbreakingly lost in game 7.  I'm ready for a Giants World Series Championship team!

Off to Bed with a Book to Read

I've had a pretty productive day of writing capped off with watching   game one of the NLCS between San Francisco Giants and Philadelphia Phillies. Giants take the opening game on the road 5-4. Cody Ross again going yard tonight. Not once but twice!  At right he celebrates after the first with Giants pitcher.

San Francisco Wins Series - Advance to NLCS! Celebrating!

Outfielder Cody Ross Homers in the game tonight.  The Giants win the series on the Road in Atlanta.

Everything is Nearly Right With The World This Morning

The Giants are in first place!  Wahoo!

I'm Giddy

I know it's Spring Traning and not regular season, but my San Francisco Giants are 7-1 with their 5 to 1 win over the Cubs. Kudos to Pablo Sandoval for his grand slam hommer!

Baseball is so poetic!

Baseball slips into the black hole of fall

Ah, a win for the Phillies! I know many didn't think this World Srries was the big glitzy one they had hoped for, but of the final teams in post season, these were the two I wanted to see. I would normally be drawn to root for the NL team with a few exceptions, so a Phillies win is fine with me. Still, The Rays had quite a run this year and I am happy for them none the less.

Of course with tonight's game I am now at that point where baseball now falls into the black hole of winter, not to return till spring. There is a sadness that comes with that.

"It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone." - Bart Giamatti

On another note, yesterday afternoon I was in a waiting room at the Doctor's office and was drawn by the late afternoon quiet void of activity to scribble out a draft of a poem. There, I mentioned poetry in my blog post. I feel so much better.

Technorati Tags: Life as a poet,Baeeball

Celebrate Books & Anniversary

Yesterday was our 34th wedding anniversary and among other things my wife and I did book store outing. Hey, it's like having your cake and eating it too! We always enjoy book stores. While it may not be reality based, Cathy and I are of the philosophy that books are a commodity that everyone should have available to them and that you should just have a no-limit card that can be used for books only. What a deal!

This morning I had a time set aside for a recording of four of my own poems. One or more of them will be part of a CD that is being made of some local poets. Then they will be available in September at two different events in the area. One at a library sponsored event and the other at The Writer's Place here in Kansas City. I felt like the recordings went well. I'll post more about the events soon.

The San Francisco Giants were in town for a four game series this weekend. We went to Friday nights game, a 9-4 win by the Giants. It was a great evening at the ballpark! Of course I'm an avid Giants fan so this was like heaven. Plus there was an awesome fireworks display afterwords. I shot some game pictures - when I gent then downloaded I'll post a couple.

Baseball's Back

Today.... the World is All About Baseball!

Opening day for most teams.... My team of choice, The San Francisco Giants open on the road in LA against their nemeses the Dodgers. Some see baseball as a seven month diversion from life. I see it the same way I do poetry, a great reflection of life. Play Ball!!! Go Giants!!!

A Dog's World

Deep in thought Barry rests upon my lap while I snap this picture. The thoughts... maybe when is he going to feed me, how long do I have to sit here and amuse him, or perhaps he was reworking the lines of a poem in his head. Yeah, I'm sure that must be it.

Worked on a new personal website this weekend. Hopefully it will be up before long.

Got some writing accomplished as well. Nothing sent off. Sill hope to get a few more poems off before the month ends need to sit down and see what I've still got available at the moment.

Watched the World Series games without much satisfaction. The post season over now it is truly into the saddest time of the year. Of course spring comes and with it perhaps a better season for my favorite team.

Spent some time contemplating Eliot's assertion that poets live "...in what is not merely the present, but the present moment of the past" and what this means both to awareness and of course poems that we create. Maybe that's what Barry had going on in his head too. Hee-he.

Craziness last night

I can't believe I slept till 10:20 this morning. What is even more incredible is my wife was still asleep at that time.

I has a crazy assortment of dreams during the night. I've been thinking all day about them and contemplating the creation of a poem that pulls from what I recall of them. I've been tired much of the day. Cathy suggested it was the dreams... perhaps I was worn ragged by them. Could be.

Game seven (deciding game) of the ALCS is on tonight. I am so pulling for the Indians.

I've done no writing at all today. Something I would like to rectify, but unless it happen really later, it likely won't happen.

I picked up a CD today at Starbucks... Hail Britannia - the British invasion '64-'69. Lot of good stuff from back in the day. A few things that I'm not crazy about but for the most part it's good.
something different to listen to in the car.

Where's the Beef?

Wow.... That's some big beef jerky!

Weekend is over. I succeeded in sending out more submissions as I had planed.

This morning, I was pleased to learn that a submission of a poem I wrote earlier this year but had never sent out till now has found a home! So there's the beef!

I'm reading Breakfast Served Any Time All Day- Essays on Poetry New and Selected by Donald Hall. There is some wonderful stuff in here. There are things in it that you feel as you read them you must have known because deep down they seem like truisms... yet at the same time they are new to you. I'll have more to say on some of these things later.

I have enjoyed the Indians / Yankees series. Some really exciting baseball. I have to say I'm pulling for the Indians in this series. Go Tribe!

Picked up three interesting books at the Library yesterday. They are:

• Breakfast Served Any Time of Day - by Donald Hall


• Your Own Sylvia - by Stephanie Hemphill


• Otherwise - New and Selected Poems - by Jane Kenyon

Another writer / poet friend of mine has started a blog - Scot Isom - you can check it out here.

Wow... Poet season baseball has been really incredible so far. Even without my Giants, I have been enjoying some exciting games. The Indians / Yankees series has been super! Go Tribe! What a nail bitter last night!

The Public Has Spoken

The Results are in click here. My sentiments exactly!

A Monday Medley

This is the start of a grueling week of getting things in order to be out of the office for a week. So much to do, so few nerves left to stretch.

A few bits from my journal this last week:

• a pretentious line from a love song / neither recalls the tune
• tracing a smile with his finger / her red lips kiss his index
• the days are ruled / by tweezer fingers /picking here, picking there
• crystal frost clinging to the bony flesh /of the best face one could put forward / under blistery circumstances
• a mind is a terrible thing to use when it's fucked up
• no one's here but scamper feet / who've come to witness my headache- / a mind with anxious classical thoughts / the Greek gods eavesdrop through paper walls

~0~

755
for Bud

You there when history was made
I saw you in high def
You didn’t want to be there
Your face said as much
Your looked so uncomfortable in your skin

Later you talked on your cell
I wonder who it was
There was no excitement in your face
I was excited for him
You should have stayed home

Poetric moments on the field

Watching the San Francisco Giants play the (cough) LA Dodgers I was taken in by a couple of poetic moments on the field. No, nether of them had to do with Barry Bonds hitting #755. That quest continues. The unlikely source of this artistry on the field came from the new arrival Rajai Davis a young fielder from the Pirates organization with very limited major league experience. He came in a deal that sent pitcher Matt Morris to Pittsburgh and will give the Giants another player to be named later.

While somewhat disappointed about the trade, Young Davis came up with a fantastic fielding play in center and firing to 2B to cut down a Dodger hitter challenging the young fielder for a two bagger. In the 8th, he safely bunted on, had a stolen base, then went to third on a wild pitch and was latter driven home. Oh, did I mention he hit safely in I believe the 5th? The kid definitely has wheels. ###

(sigh) I know who the winneris in Rupert Murdoch's acqusition of the Wall Street Journal. Sadly, I think I know who the loser is as well. ###

WASHINGTON, D.C. - A special court that routinely has approved eavesdropping operations has put new restrictions on the ability of U.S. spy agencies to intercept e-mails and phone calls of suspected terrorists overseas, U.S. officials said Wednesday.The previously undisclosed ruling by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has prompted concern among senior intelligence officials and lawmakers that the efforts by U.S. spy agencies to track terrorism suspects could be impaired at a dangerous time. Gee - I suppose this is the consequences of not being able to trust them not to abuse of this power. ###

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