Sure, it may not be December 24th, but for this young lad, it may as well be. Because I know that no matter what happens tomorrow, no matter how bad work is, no matter how much I hear about kU and their final four appearance, I will at least have sweet, glorious, wonderful baseball to watch all afternoon.
Thank the heavens. It has been too long.
And now, Mark Fenske's thoughts on the matter:
Leaving work to go to a baseball game will make a difference inside you.
Leaving work to go to a baseball game opens something inside your heart that advertising has been doing its best to lock up.
The quest for award-winning work keeps you at work late.
The struggle to do better than those around you makes you work through dinner, get up early, cancel the vacation you planned.
There are times these sacrifices bear fruit.
Mostly they don't.
Because greatness at writing ads comes only partly from how hard you work at reaching inside yourself.
A greater deal of it has to do with being a person worth reaching into.
Leaving work to go to a baseball game is a sign you have taken charge of your life.
It's a sign you accept death is coming and have chosen what to do about it for today.
It will do you no good to learn to write from your heart if you have nothing in your heart.
I was slow to learn this.
Here's hoping you won't be.
Go give your heart away for the afternoon to a team who can break it.
Eat the hot dogs and damn the sodium because we are for lives that are more full than they are long.
March 30, 2008
March 26, 2008
How do you keep this off the field?
Joey Gathright is raw, not doubt. He's only been playing baseball since he was 17, and his bat-handling and glove-handling skills are not yet refined.
But I don't care.
This kid is not only the most athletic player in baseball, but maybe the most athletic in all of sports. Don't believe me? Just watch this video from him in college:
And this one from a spring training game last night. Keep in mind, he did all this on the fly and without any sort of pre-meditation:
And they say football players are the real athletes. Puh-leez.
But I don't care.
This kid is not only the most athletic player in baseball, but maybe the most athletic in all of sports. Don't believe me? Just watch this video from him in college:
And this one from a spring training game last night. Keep in mind, he did all this on the fly and without any sort of pre-meditation:
And they say football players are the real athletes. Puh-leez.
Nice framing
Mike the Mad Biologist wins a gold star for this quote:
The other thing we evolutionary biologists don't do enough of, and this stems from the previous point, is make an emotional and moral case for the study of evolution. Last night, I concluded my talk with a quote from Dover, PA creationist school board member William Cunningham, who declared, "Two thousand years ago someone died on a cross. Can't someone take a stand for him?"
My response was, "In the last two minutes, someone died from a bacterial infection. We take a stand for him."
The other thing we evolutionary biologists don't do enough of, and this stems from the previous point, is make an emotional and moral case for the study of evolution. Last night, I concluded my talk with a quote from Dover, PA creationist school board member William Cunningham, who declared, "Two thousand years ago someone died on a cross. Can't someone take a stand for him?"
My response was, "In the last two minutes, someone died from a bacterial infection. We take a stand for him."
March 25, 2008
The world is coming to an end.
We just haven't figured out why yet. In stories by the Palm Beach Post and New York Times, it seems that bees, pollinator of most of America's crops, and bats, eater of most of the world's creepy-crawlies, are dying. The scary part? We have no idea why.
The government, as per the usual, is attempting to fix the problem by (what else) throwing money ($100 million over 5 years, to be exact) at the problem. As per the usual, though, the bill to acquire the money is stuck in Congress, and won't likely be passed any time soon.
The government, as per the usual, is attempting to fix the problem by (what else) throwing money ($100 million over 5 years, to be exact) at the problem. As per the usual, though, the bill to acquire the money is stuck in Congress, and won't likely be passed any time soon.
March 23, 2008
Get on the Bandwagon.
I don't know if you've heard the local, regional or national rumblings about our Boys in Blue, but word is they're going to be a lot of fun to watch this season. We all know they probably aren't going to win the Series, but they're getting closer and in April, we've got just as good a chance as anybody.
If you don't believe me, check out this 2007 highlight reel to see just how good these young ballplayers can be.
If you don't believe me, check out this 2007 highlight reel to see just how good these young ballplayers can be.
March 21, 2008
Whoa, wait, wha?
That's all I could really muster. Check out the article/pics that have me baffled here.
March 19, 2008
It's here.
A buddy of mine snapped this photo in California. The only question now is this: How long before I'm paying $4 in Missouri?
March 17, 2008
This is America's Game.
Why is baseball referred to as America's pasttime? Well, this story on ESPN pretty much says it all. A legend. A legendary place. The better part of a century of history. All wrapped into one nice, sunny package in Vero Beach, FL.
Somebody tell me how River Falls could ever come close to this.
Somebody tell me how River Falls could ever come close to this.
March 16, 2008
March 14, 2008
This guy is smart.
I wish more of my college professors took this approach. I know I would have made it to class a lot more often.
A quote from the genius:
"It took me a decade to come to the realization," says Lewin at his MIT office, "that really what counts is not what you cover, but what counts is what you uncover."
That sounds like pretty good advice to me.
A quote from the genius:
"It took me a decade to come to the realization," says Lewin at his MIT office, "that really what counts is not what you cover, but what counts is what you uncover."
That sounds like pretty good advice to me.
Does this kind of scare anybody else?
I'm proud to say that in my 23 years here, I've never shot or even held an actual firearm. To be honest, I don't think I ever really want to. I just don't like the idea of wielding an object that is designed with killing in mind.
What I'd like to know about guns and America is this: what's the fucking draw? I certainly don't know, but I bet these people do.
What I'd like to know about guns and America is this: what's the fucking draw? I certainly don't know, but I bet these people do.
March 12, 2008
March 11, 2008
I am white people
Today is March 11. Today, it was warm outside for the first time in ages. Today, I am white people.
If you don't believe me, look here.
If you don't believe me, look here.
March 9, 2008
Progress.
Well, my thoughts are still all intertwined and knotted up, but slowly and surely I'm making progress to straighten them out.
A good friend and (I think) regular reader of this blog told me to do one analog thing everyday. That's helped. I'm starting to rediscover the joy of being without the information and boxed entertainment that surrounds me. Today, I just sat with the one I love and talked and talked and talked in a room with the TV and the radio and the computer off. It was fun. It made me realize that maybe always devouring knowledge and information and words and pictures and canned stories isn't such a good thing. Maybe sometimes it's better to really try to wrap your head around what you've already got instead.
I'd type more, but I'm off to think for awhile -- with the lid of this laptop closed. Lately, I seem to do it better that way.
A good friend and (I think) regular reader of this blog told me to do one analog thing everyday. That's helped. I'm starting to rediscover the joy of being without the information and boxed entertainment that surrounds me. Today, I just sat with the one I love and talked and talked and talked in a room with the TV and the radio and the computer off. It was fun. It made me realize that maybe always devouring knowledge and information and words and pictures and canned stories isn't such a good thing. Maybe sometimes it's better to really try to wrap your head around what you've already got instead.
I'd type more, but I'm off to think for awhile -- with the lid of this laptop closed. Lately, I seem to do it better that way.
Halo doesn't kill people. People kill people.
I saw today that some senator from Illinois (let's just call him Douche McGee) is trying to push through a bill that would help to curb the sale of violent video games to kids, parents, full-grown adults or just about anybody else who wants to get their shoot-em-up on. He's claiming that committing violence on a TV screen prepares and encourages people, and especially teens, to do the same thing in real life.
You have GOT to be kidding me.
I can tell you right now that 99.99% of gamers are jerks. They scream into their microphones. They berate you for having a negative kill-to-death ratio, for stealing their kill or even for getting in their way. They use racial epithets. They are annoying in the most annoying sense of the word.
But they are NOT killers.
I know a lot of online gamers who play FPS (First Person Shooters, for the uninitiated) games with both online and offline friends. We think they're fun. We think they're a great way to entertain ourselves for hours on end. But most of all, we think that a little meaningless online killing is a great way to relax at the end of a long, hard day at work.
All that said, here's what video games are really all about:
You have GOT to be kidding me.
I can tell you right now that 99.99% of gamers are jerks. They scream into their microphones. They berate you for having a negative kill-to-death ratio, for stealing their kill or even for getting in their way. They use racial epithets. They are annoying in the most annoying sense of the word.
But they are NOT killers.
I know a lot of online gamers who play FPS (First Person Shooters, for the uninitiated) games with both online and offline friends. We think they're fun. We think they're a great way to entertain ourselves for hours on end. But most of all, we think that a little meaningless online killing is a great way to relax at the end of a long, hard day at work.
All that said, here's what video games are really all about:
March 4, 2008
How are changes made?
I'm a simple guy, and I try to live a simple life. But sometimes (and by "sometimes" I mean "for the last few months") I feel like all the thoughts in my head have been tangled up together in a big undoable knot that looks something like this:
Is this normal?
Is this the mindset of adulthood?
I hope not.
But if it is, I don't really want to grow up.
Is it just because I think too much?
Possibly.
My mind, though it seems unfocused at times, is always devoting its electric pulses to one facet of life or another.
Is it because secretly, deep down inside, I secretly don't like the nest I've made for myself?
Yes.
But I think, to a degree, we all deal with that problem.
But even so, I'm just not happy,
and I never want to become the frustrated suit with a short temper.
I don't want to be the one that flips the bird at the car following too close,
or the the boss that flips out on the intern for no reason,
or the angry drunk who looks for someone to fight at the bar,
then finds her at home instead.
But what do I do to get happy?
I know I've got to slow down.
Stop shooing away the minutae of life with mind-alterers
and start welcoming them with open arms.
I know I need to start living right.
Thinking. Reading. Challenging. Expanding my mind.
Instead of sticking to the same old routine of mind-numbing entertainment from the big black box in the corner.
But what else?
How else do I start on the path to a healthier body,
and uncluttered mind
and a simpler, fuller life?
I'm going to keep searching for the answer to my question,
but, if you have a minute or two, I'd like your help, too.
How do you get happy?
How do you calm yourself?
How do you fill your days with happiness and serenity?
Tell me.
Because lately mine are full of something else.
And it smells awfully bad.
Is this normal?
Is this the mindset of adulthood?
I hope not.
But if it is, I don't really want to grow up.
Is it just because I think too much?
Possibly.
My mind, though it seems unfocused at times, is always devoting its electric pulses to one facet of life or another.
Is it because secretly, deep down inside, I secretly don't like the nest I've made for myself?
Yes.
But I think, to a degree, we all deal with that problem.
But even so, I'm just not happy,
and I never want to become the frustrated suit with a short temper.
I don't want to be the one that flips the bird at the car following too close,
or the the boss that flips out on the intern for no reason,
or the angry drunk who looks for someone to fight at the bar,
then finds her at home instead.
But what do I do to get happy?
I know I've got to slow down.
Stop shooing away the minutae of life with mind-alterers
and start welcoming them with open arms.
I know I need to start living right.
Thinking. Reading. Challenging. Expanding my mind.
Instead of sticking to the same old routine of mind-numbing entertainment from the big black box in the corner.
But what else?
How else do I start on the path to a healthier body,
and uncluttered mind
and a simpler, fuller life?
I'm going to keep searching for the answer to my question,
but, if you have a minute or two, I'd like your help, too.
How do you get happy?
How do you calm yourself?
How do you fill your days with happiness and serenity?
Tell me.
Because lately mine are full of something else.
And it smells awfully bad.
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