Tagged: hurricane ike
Mooch accomplished…
…as I am sitting on a friend’s floor with power and using someone’s wireless connection that they’ve left unsecured.
Still no cable. I’m not terribly far from my house and obviously the
whole city was affected by the hurricane. Only bunny ears with just
CBS, so at least I can watch NCIS and some news. No FSN or My20, or
even ESPN. But I’ve got Internet!
So who saw Fausto Carmona and Gary Sheffield’s reenactment of the Nolan
Ryan-Robin Ventura conflagration? If you didn’t, have no fear–I have
a link.
Matt Joyce is officially one of my new favorite players because not
only does he wear amazing socks, but he simply dove to the ground and
covered his head and neck with his arms when the fight became too
much. Makes a girl want to dash in and rescue him, and then hug him
and make him some chamomile tea.
Uhhh the Astros won! And the Rockies got their booties kicked.
And that’s it for now, I guess. Going to the game Tuesday.
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I’m going home…
…somewhat unfortunately.
We still haven’t got power, and getting Comcast out to pull all the cable lines out of the street is no easy feat. So I probably won’t have another blog post for awhile, unless I can bribe friends to let me mooch their connections to the outside world.
I’m just hoping for hot water. Boiling water on the (thankfully) gas stove to do dishes is getting OLD.
And I just hate thinking about those who are SO MUCH WORSE OFF than we are. I mean, people don’t have houses. Brandon Backe’s island is underwater. And the Rockies are mathematically eliminated.
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I have escaped…
…into a part of North Texas in which I have Internet and power.
Unfortunately there is no FSN, but that might be a good thing given the Astros’ recent performance. It was enough to check the score on the computer. Nobody really wants to watch their team get crushed by the MARLINS. I mean, really.
The worst part is that it seems that every time the Astros win, the Rockies lose. It’s like I have to sacrifice one team’s win for another team’s. I was okay with that when they were playing each other, but not so much now.
Oh, and by the way, the Marlins are ONE GAME BEHIND THE ASTROS IN THE WILD CARD RACE. Non mi piace (or no me gusta… got to work on that Spanish again).
I don’t really have much else to say. I can’t expect Backe, who hasn’t been able to get in contact with family and friends since the, oh, I don’t know, HURRICANE to be able to pitch a good game. I know they won’t use it as an excuse but COME ON. The island is freaking underwater. I think it works just fine as an excuse.
Ciao, amici.
♥
AUUGUGGGHGHHGHH…
…ought to just about cover it.
We still haven’t got power. I’m mooching off a friend’s electricity and Internet right now, because I was going a bit stir-crazy. Driving’s pretty hard–you have to know exactly where you’re going because if you don’t there might be a tree in your way and you’re screwed. Power and cable lines are down all the heck over the place and there are branches in the road and there’s not water anywhere anymore except maybe in people’s houses.
So for the last few days I’ve been sitting in a (thankfully) naturally air-conditioned home reading the Stephanie Plum novels by Janet Evanovich in backwards order starting with eleven and taking occasional walks.
However, you know what the Astros have been doing?
Not only were they screwed into playing, essentially, home games for the Cubs, but they got NO-HIT. OH MY GOD. When we finally got the paper yesterday I took a Sharpie and drew all over that giant picture of Carlos Zambrano. UUGGGHHH as if I didn’t hate the Cubs and Big Z enough. I mean, I hate the Red Sox but I was really excited and proud of Jon Lester when he had his no-no. But I REALLY HATE THE CUBS. Mostly Big Z because once he was batting against Roy Oswalt and he struck out and he broke his bat over his knee… which was really dumb…
If the airports were open I swear I would have used my free flights and flown out to Milwaukee to scream for my ‘Stros. I swear.
And, oh and, the ROCKIES KEEP LOSING. I am getting SO impatient with my teams.
In other news…
– some epic disappointment. Honestly, people never cease to surprise me, and sometimes I really wish they would.
– Don, I don’t know you if you read my blog–I doubt you do–but if you happen to, good luck, man.
– I HATE NOT BEING ABLE TO WATCH BASEBALL!
That is all.
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Game Log: 11 September 2008
Still have power and cable, so here’s the entry.
I figured that since it was Heroes Night this game would be packed–but I didn’t take into account the huge HURRICANE that is heading straight for our city. So I got there only twenty minutes before game time and was still one of the first 10,000 fans (and got a patriotic cap, sponsored by Food Town… yippee). The paid attendance was somewhere around 31,000 but there could not have been more than 15,000 people there. We could hear the umpire calling strikes from the fourth deck.
Before the game, a Marine’s family came out to throw the first pitch. They showed a surprise video from him in Iraq apologizing that he couldn’t make the game, and then the announcer said, “Oh, and we have a surprise guest” and out comes the Marine! I teared up in a big way as he threw the first pitch… it was wonderful.
The game had a very relaxed atmosphere. Half the team was signing autographs, and I kicked myself for not taking the hurricane into consideration when planning for my game excursion. But I do have almost the whole team on my hat, so that’s not that big of a deal. Anyhow, whenever a foul ball went towards a guy in the on-deck circle, he would pick it up and toss it to the crowd. Roy Oswalt mis-tossed one of the fouls and it fell down the screen, so he actually walked over to a child in the Diamond Club and put the baseball in his hand. I was epically jealous.
We in the city of Houston have become such scoreboard watchers. Not only was I tracking the Rockies game (*sniff*) but also the Cardinals/Cubs game and the Brewers game. Fortunately, the Brewers and the Cardinals both lost, so we’re only three behind now.
I had a big bag of Cracker Jack–only one concession stand out of thirty plus was open. We also had a different announcer than the usual Bob Ford, who’s been doing games as long as I can remember. This new guy couldn’t pronounce “Doumit,” which got really annoying after a few innings. The stores were closed and the baseball card stand was closed, which was okay because I bought my pack of Topps on Wednesday–and got a new Luke Scott and also a Josh Anderson rookie card 🙂
Anywho, Roy Oswalt pitched a pretty-much perfect game, seeing as he allowed three hits and every one of those hits was immediately followed by a double play. He faced the minimum 27 batters, struck out four, and we scored six runs en route to a four-game sweep of the Pittsburgh Pirates.
In other news…
– Micah Owings is officially a Red…….. ohhhhhhhh I HATE that stupid Adam Dunn trade.
– have I mentioned THE HURRICANE yet? yIKEs.
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I was going to try…
…to blog about last night’s game right now.
But I have a paper due on Tuesday and since I probably won’t have power in a few hours, I’m writing it now. Hopefully I’ll have a blog entry up at some point soon after the storm.
Take a hike, Ike.
We’re gonna get smashed. Still thirteen or fourteen hours until landfall and Galveston’s already practically underwater.
See you in a couple days.
♥
Game Log: 10 September 2008
I hadn’t been planning on going to this game so I bought a last-minute Outfield Deck ticket on astros.com. Instead of the $7 it would have been at the window, it was almost $18, but well worth it because the extra $11 meant I didn’t have to wait in the will-call line. Once again I took the train downtown, which is actually only $1 and six blocks’ walk (and parking is $5 at cheapest).
I dashed through the Crawford Boxes to look for balls lying around but there were none, so I headed over to right field because Brian Moehler, a righty, was pitching for the ‘Stros. I caught nothing but I got to watch as Jeff Karstens tried to toss a ball to a kid who dropped it seven or eight times before Jeff gave up and put it in his hand. Brandon Moss gave a ball to a little boy without even being asked–it was sweet.
Then I went over for autographs and tried to get close to the dugout because Mark “I-hit-a-homer-on-the-first-Major-League-pitch-I-ever-saw” Saccomanno was signing, but I couldn’t make it. The girl next to me kept yelling at a stretching Hunter to come sign something, but the guys who are stretching almost never sign. Somehow he actually came over and signed for a few minutes, and as he signed my hat I looked up at him and said, “I know you don’t remember but at spring training you signed a shirt for my niece, and it made her father really happy” and he laughed and said something to the tune of “I’m glad to hear it.” He’s a cutie, even if he is apparently dating a Playboy bunny.
The game itself was pretty much amazing. I sat in my favorite section, the section on the very edge of the third-base side upper deck. It’s awesome because the train is right below you, and if the roof is open you have an unrestricted view of downtown. I screamed for Miggy’s grand salami, and I went downstairs to the row behind the bullpen for the last few innings. It was fun and I actually lost my voice.
I know I was a huge Negative Nancy about the Astros this season, but seriously, guys, really? Could this actually happen?
In other news…
– the Rockies SUCK. I don’t understand. They were doing so well *bursts into tears*
– Hurricane Ike (or, more appropriately, Ick) is actually physically going to eat us. The Cubs games for this weekend have been postponed.
– I also went last night, so I’ll post that post right after I finish this one.
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Blake Street Blogger 