House Cleaning & Baseball Memories

What with working way too much last year, and the Christmas season being nuts for the post office, and then all of my time off recently involving trips somewhere (either short or long), I really have made quite a cluttered mess of my house over the last few months. I have a lot of stuff, so in order to be able to find anything, I have to know exactly where it is. A place for everything, and everything in its place, so to speak. This hasn't been the case lately, and it has bothered me to some degree. I finally have a weekend where I'm not going anywhere; not going to any hockey games, not going to any concerts, nothing involving even leaving the house since getting home from work Saturday afternoon. Aaaaahhhhhh.....

What this means is, I can finally tackle some of the "putting things away" task that I've been sorely neglecting for far too long. For example, in going thru one of many piles of books and papers, I came across all the ticket stubs from my Pacific Northwest vacation that I took with my Mom in March of 2010 (yes, that's nearly a year ago already...I told you it's been far too long since I did this...). Which reminds me, I never wrote THAT trip up on this site...something else to put in the mental rolodex for a future write-up here...

In putting the ticket stubs away in a binder that I have for just such things, I started to look thru the entire binder, which contains ticket stubs from nearly every event I've ever gone to in my life. I'm not talking about movie stubs, but concerts, sporting events, museums, things like that. And all my brain needs is that small piece of paper to trigger a whole series of memories relating to that event. One of the ones that really caught my eye last night was 2 stubs to a New York Mets baseball game from September 18, 1981. It was the second Major League Baseball game I ever went to. I was a couple months past my 10th birthday, and baseball was the biggest thing in my life. That year involved a strike that lasted nearly 2 months, which must have been devastating for me.

The biggest memories those ticket stubs bring up are the weeks of anticipation I had, knowing I was going to an actual game. Even though I lived less than a 10 minute drive from Shea Stadium, going to games just wasn't something my family did. We used to go to my grandmother's house in College Point every Sunday, and on the drive to and from our house in Whitestone, you could see Shea Stadium exactly 2 miles off to the southwest as we drove in the car along 20th Avenue. It seemed like it was an eternity away. I used to wish that Shea Stadium was at the southeast corner of 14th Avenue & 127th Street, because every time we stopped at the light at that 5 corners intersection, it just seemed like the perfect place for the park to be. And then I would be able to experience the sights and smells of the game up close and personal at least once a week. I don't remember exactly when it was official that I would be going to that game in September with my Dad, but I do remember it seemed like FOREVER until that day came...time passes so much more slowly when you're a kid.

The other thing that really struck my mind instantly upon seeing those ticket stubs was the feeling I got when I first walked thru the tunnel out to the field level seating area, and the way I felt when I first was able to lay my eyes on a field of grass that was the greenest green I had ever seen. I'd been watching games on TV for several years at that point already, despite my young age. I was more of a Yankees fan than a Mets fan, but I still rooted for the Mets, and watched every telecast I could. This was back in the days when almost every game would have been on a local non-cable channel (WPIX Channel 11 for the Yankees, and WWOR Channel 9 for the Mets). Those announcers for both teams became like friends for me, seeing as I got to listen to them for endless hours during my childhood years. Phil Rizzuto, Bill White, and Frank Messer for the Yankees, and Ralph Kiner and Bob Murphy for the Mets were voices I heard probably more often than my parents when I was growing up.

However, watching games on TV did nothing to prepare me for actually walking into the seating area and seeing the field laid out before me. I'd been playing little league baseball for a while by this time, and hanging out in local parks playing games, so I was used to dirty and dusty fields, which had grass that seemed fine to me. But it paled in comparison to the vast field of lushness that greeted my eyes. I had been to a Yankee game 3 years earlier (my 7th birthday, matter of fact), but that had been a day game. This game had an 8:05PM start time, so seeing the glow of the artificial lights illuminate the pristine playing surface laid out before me was truly breathtaking. Again, picture this thru the eyes of a baseball-enamored 10 year old boy; I'd pretty much gone to heaven.

I don't really remember anything about the game itself, but that's not the point. The memories I do have from that night and the experience in general are ones that I will treasure forever, and no matter what picture I try to find online of Shea Stadium, nothing will compare with the images on the mental projector that are sparked by those 2 ticket stubs.

Thanks, Dad.


Blog Post Soundtrack; Led Zeppelin, Liz Phair, Black Flag, Traditional Japanese, Refused, AC/DC, The Misfits (live covering Black Flag), Fu Manchu, Pearl Jam (live), Paul Simon, ZZ Top, Nirvana, Monty Python, Deftones, Pantera, The Chenical Brothers, Skeleton Key, Helmet, Desert Sessions, Mr. Bungle, Queens Of The Stone Age (live), Primus (live), Eric Burdon & War

What I've Been Up To

Working.


That's pretty much it. This is the first time I've had a day off other than Sunday since late June, so I spent most of Friday exercising and sleeping. Today, in addition to those two tasks, I've also done laundry, and written up a couple of things for my friend's site, Unseen Films. He's got a Be-Labored Day Week coming up in early September where films that are highly praised will be knocked down a peg or two, because they aren't REALLY as good as everyone seems to think they are, if you really look at them. I'm picking apart the original Star Wars Trilogy from the 1970's, because as much FUN as they are, they really aren't that good as far as films go.

Besides the Star Wars demolition, I also wrote up a review of the Cinematic Titanic Live version of East Meets Watts. CT is the current incarnation of Mystery Science Theatre 3000, the masters of taking bad movies and making them FAR more entertaining then they ever were before they sat there and made fun of them as they played. Here's a film that was terrible to begin with, but by having the 5 CT members sitting there on stage in front of a live audience making comments on JUST how bad the movie is, it becomes immensely entertaining, and I was laughing thru the entire 90 minutes. Having been into MST3K for about 20 years now, it's nice to see them still doing what they do best, and I might even try to make it to one of their live shows sooner or later.

Had a couple other interesting things go on recently as well, but that's just so in-depth and lengthy that I just don't feel like going into it right now...but I will eventually...


Blog Post Soundtrack; Primus, The Who, Lily Allen, Metallica

Rise And Shine

I love getting up at the same time on my days off as I do when I'm supposed to go to work. It's nice being up that early and knowing that I don't have to go out, that all of that time that I normally have to be at work is now completely mine, free to do whatever chores or things have to be done, at a nice relaxing pace. Obviously things that are fun are mixed in too (there will be some NHL 10 on the XBox 360 played today!). I prefer this to sleeping in, waking up and realizing that half of the day off is already gone. I've always been a morning person, I tend to get more done earlier anyway. Usually, if I haven't accomplished something by noon, it's probably not gonna happen until tomorrow. Remember those old US Army commercials, with the tagline, "We get more done by 9AM than most people do all day"? For lots of reasons, I'm very proud of the fact that I'm not most people.


Blog Post Soundtrack; Judas Priest, Beastie Boys, The Doors, Voivod

Consecutive days off...

...are a wonderful thing, not to be taken for granted. As much as I enjoy my split days off schedule, the downside is that by the end of the single day off, when I'm just starting to really get into the being-off mood, and starting to accomplish things, it's almost time to get ready to go back to work the next day. Having 2 (or more) days off in a row allows me to be so much more productive. I can get so many stupid little things done around the house, while at the same time not neglect the meaningless activites that make life so much fun (NHL '09 for the XBox 360, for example). I think the fact that I know it's meaningless gives me a leg up. I may get all into it at the time, but even as I'm cursing the referee for making such a stupid call (I did NOT trip that guy...), I'm aware of the fact that this isn't actually important. The fact that I'm enjoying life and having fun, that has some intrinsic value.