Thanksgiving

I was going to post a summary of our Thanksgiving in North Carolina, but thankfully Christina did so today and saved me the trouble.

The World Has Changed

So I wake up this morning to the headline Japanese war effort sets sail. I know they're our allies. They surrendered to us 27 years before I was born. Maybe there are too many World War Two movies out there. But a little piece of me went, "Uh oh," before realizing this was a good thing. I think.



Anyway, I've been wondering a lot lately what headlines I'm going to wake up to. Part of me scans the news every morning for "Bin Laden's Body Found in Cave Rubble" or "Bastard Who Was Mailing Anthrax Found and Strung up By Thumbs." I mean, those have to be the top two, right? But I wonder. Anticipation is a tricky thing. The news lately turns out to be so different that what we expect. Sometimes for the worse..."94-year-old woman dies of anthrax". Sometimes for the better..."Taliban run screaming like little girls." So it's not that I'm pessimistic. I think there will be a day with a great headline. I just have to wonder if it'll be any less surprising than finding out that the Japanese navy is setting sail for a war zone again...

Liar, Liar Pants on Fire

So baseball is talking about getting rid of my beloved Twins. This is apalling on so many levels.

• First is the dismantling of the Twins. Sure, take the team of my childhood and rip them up without so much as a further thought. It's like the Mayflowers in the middle of the night moving the Colts out of Baltimore or the Browns going the other way. (Though that loss was just temporary.) And for what? Because the owner is tired of running the team and wants the cash to retire? The Twins are a decent team, and they've shown the ability to draw fans when the franchise doesn't put a joke of a team on the field.
  
  
• "There exists no prospective market . . . [for an] economically viable franchise for next season." Ahem. Looking around me, I see one. The nation's capital (or Northern Virginia, if they must) can easily support a team. As I heard someone point out, the idea that it would detract from Baltimore is a red herring. Hire an accountant. Figure out the value of the Orioles before and after. Pay Peter Angelos the difference, plus a bonus if he'll just shut up. It'll be a lot less that the $500 million they're talking about giving to the Twins and Expos to go away.
  
  
• The offer to expand other teams' rosters to make up for the jobs lost is a joke. It makes sense for a couple of hours (at least to me), then falls apart. If you play a numbers game, the total number of jobs goes up. But what ends up happening? You eliminate 8 starting non-pitcher jobs (9 if you have a designated hitter), and 4 or so pitchers who start on a regular basis. Even on a "small market" team like the Twins, that's a lot of million-dollar jobs. And you create 2 jobs per team at the end of the bench, where the guys are lucky to be earning $200K/year. Now, I don't have a lot of sympathy for the athletes, but it's appalling that the owners would present this as a "fair deal."
  
  

I could go on, but the point is that sports is supposed to be fun. If they get rid of the Twins, baseball will be about as much fun as watching Scrooge McDuck count his money. If so, good bye and good riddance from this Twins fan. I'd rather watch arena football.

Hail to the Redskins

I went to the Redskins game today and watched them beat the Seahawks 27-14. It was a lot of fun, especially since the Redskins dominated the game. George's uncle had an extra ticket, so I went with George, his uncle and some guys they know. George's uncle has had season tickets for 45 years. He said the first tickets he bought were $19.90 for a season's worth (6) tickets. He bought them with his paper money while he was in high school. People like him are why I don't hold out much hope of moving off the season ticket waiting list any time soon.

I took the digital camera Christina won in a radio station contest recently. I didn't get many opportunities for pictures, and not all of them turned out, but the above is from where we parked, and below is from our seats.

Trick or Treat

Well, the trick-or-treaters have come and gone for the evening. It could be my imagination, but I think there were fewer of them this year. Maybe everybody's just scared. As a result, I have much candy left over.

This year's crop of trick-or-treaters seemed nice enough. I'm generally too busy doling out the candy to judge the merits of the costumes, but I'm certain able to judge the kids' etiquette.

Here, for public edification is my list of trick-or-treating no-nos.
DON'T

• Just shove your treat bag at me wordlessly. It's called "trick-or-treating" for a reason. Say "trick-or-treat", accept the candy, say "thank you" and move on. I'm not a cafeteria employee or something. (And you should say "thank you" to them, too.)
  I did have a couple of kids tonight who not only didn't say anything, but they didn't even present their trick or treat bag. Poor kids; I think they were just shy.
  
  
  
  
• Try to grab the treats out of my bowl. I'm not naive enough to think that letting kids pick candy out themselves will result in anything but one kid taking half the bowl. So don't come up and try to grab it when I don't offer your choice. I had one kid who, dissatisfied with the Junior Mints I had given him along with his lollipop, put them back, started to grab for some Nerds while saying, "Can I trade..." I cut him off with "no", but let him keep the lollipop. Should have kept the Junior Mints, kid, you could have traded it for something. (Upon hearing this story, Christina chastised me for being "mean" to the kid. I countered I was just doling out valuable life lessons.) By the way, making candy requests is OK. ("Ooh, can I have a lollipop?")
  
  
• Collect for UNICEF. It's trick-or-treat, not trick-or-money. Didn't get any of those, but I'm just warning you.
  
  
• Go door-to-door without a costume. Apparently this is a cool thing to do for the junior high school set. Ooh, I can get candy without having to degrade myself by dressing up. Well, guess what kids, dressing up is fun, and you're missing out by going as "kid in a sweatshirt."
  
  

That's about all I have to complain about for now. Have fun, and don't get sick on all that candy.