Astronomical spring is five days away, and baseball season begins in less than two weeks, on Thursday, March 28, to be exact. If I correctly remember what I read, it is the earliest opening day ever, and, as last year, every team in both leagues will be scheduled to play. I don’t follow baseball as closely as I once did, but I am enough of an old fogey that the words “opening day” still get my attention. It is an undeniable moment of seasonal and attitudinal transition. Things just seem a tiny bit more normal when baseball is being played. Good thing, too. That’s about 75 percent of the year.
Wouldst it were so
By Jimmy Johnson
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27 responses to “Wouldst it were so”
Opening Day has a special connotation to it. I only made it to one, about 25 years ago at the old Tiger Stadium. It was cold but not football cold and it was a way to “force” spring on yourself. However many an opening day was and I’m sure this year will be, greeted with snow flurries or postponed.
Jimmy:
Did you correct that? Thanks!
Football players can slide around on ice and slosh around in mud but baseball is a more refined, dignified endeavor. Baseball should never be played in foul weather or with temperatures below 70 degrees.
This is just wrong. This year DST lasts 238 days. That’s 65.2% of the year. That means I’ll potentially lose an hour of starlight almost 2 of 3 nights that the clouds cooperate.
Maybe I should sell my telescopes and quit whining. There are much better photos online than I’ll ever see through a telescope.
https://media1.tenor.com/images/fc5bddbc0a776888f5f0a70efb5eb9a1/tenor.gif?itemid=8862281
The baseball season really kicks off next week- The Oakland A’s and Seattle Mariners play two games in Tokyo on March 20 and 21.
I’m not a fan of starting the season before April and really dislike staring it this early.
Those games are not official: http://www.sportingnews.com/us/mlb/news/mlb-opening-day-2019-schedule-for-all-30-teams/16vg11pnw02ql1pt42fofkth3y
My preference is an early April start for pro baseball, and in this country. Canada is still too cold, and I see no benefit at all in playing on another continent. Similarly for pro football in, say, GB.
I suppose I’m such an old-fogey that I’ve given up on “modern broadcast television” entirely…I haven’t watched it at all in the two years I’ve been in Oklahoma, and I now realize that when I had the TV on prior to that, it was primarily as “background noise”.
When time permits (if it ever does), I would like to explore some of the on-line series. One that comes to mind is “The Man in the High Castle.” Anyone have suggestions for other such productions that would be worth the investment of my time?
Except for sports, about the only time that I watch TV is when something major is happening locally or there is major weather coming in. Having said that, sometimes the networks or PBS will have a special or concert on that I like. I do enjoy the Big Bang Theory, but it is on cable so much I forget that it is still on CBS (at least for another 5 episodes)
I think that you meant ALL TV. For me there is the Food Network and Hallmark movies. I am hoping one day one of my wife’s books is turned into a Hallmark movie. Of course not staring Lori Loughlin!
Steve, I finally got curious enough to follow the link you provide with your name. The results were disappointing:
Not Acceptable
An appropriate representation of the requested resource / could not be found on this server.
You may want to modify your information.
http://marianneevans.com/index.html This is what I see when I click on Steve’s name/link
I get quite a kick out of “Big Bang Theory” – the characters remind me of all my nerdy friends and I in college (University of Oklahoma, Ghost). We did a fair amount of stupid stuff (taking a huge snowball up in one of the dorm elevators comes to mind – it wasn’t the going up that was the problem, it was how to get rid of it when we heard the dean was coming to see what was going on. Hint – opening the 8th floor door and pushing it down the supposedly empty shaft did not turn out well). We also had a lot of fun (like using the phone network wiring to broadcast an Indie radio station that floated from dorm room to dorm room – the genius who figured out how to do that was eventually hired by those who failed to shut it down). The husband and I watch a lot of “old” stuff aired for free on Prime – we like Inspector Lewis and its predecessor Inspector Morse.
Now, it works. I don’t know why it didn’t before. I tried two different devices, too
Ghost
Death in Paradise on PBS
Some of the Dr Blake mysteries (made in Australia) again on PBS
Otherwise Cooking & Science channels.
Thanks one and all for the info / viewing previous posts, esp to the one that emailed me, realizing that I was likely missing replies on what had become prev. posts.
An innocent typo maybe 10 days back: It’s wigeon, not widgeon. Related oddity: it’s Dutchess Co., NY, not Duchess. I grew up in NYC, but partly also nr Pawling, NY, a few mi N of Putnam Co. Didn’t know my best friend of 60 yr was growing up there, in Brewster, which I saw regularly from the NY Central RR en route to Pawling in Dutchess Co. Am forever grateful that we both decided on Cornell U. [Nr Ithaca, Tompkins Co., NY.
FDR grew up in Hyde Park, on the Hudson, western border of Dutchess Co., “That man in the White House!”
Peace,
For various reasons, I care about baseball less and less as I age.
Around here, “opening day” means the start of fishing season. Generally coincides w/ Mothers’ Day, to reinforce stereotypes: men out fishing, women left home.
We may have finally “broken the back of winter.” 10 day forecast predicts continuous frost free highs starting tomorrow, and the first frost free overnight on M 25 March.
No peregrine eggs yet, either in Baltimore or a Great Spirit Bluff, SE MN.
Peace,
Whoops: Happy St. Urho’s Day. emb
In these parts “opening day” refers to huntin’ season! Especially the deer hunt.
From iowahawkblog: “I always feel sorry for March 16 because it’s wedged between Pi Day, Ides of March, and St Patrick’s. Maybe we should designate it Ringo Starr Day.”
Ghost
March 16 is St. Urho’s Day
http://www.sainturho.com/
Last 2 links did not post
https://www.google.com/search?q=st+urho%27s+day&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b-1
Read this second
http://sainturho.com/origin.htm
and “Last 2 links” 3rd
Found my ? right on my keyboard – left a mess.
Well that is inconvenient ? comes out as a query.
I don’t know how I missed this last weekend…
https://image-store.slidesharecdn.com/2db2dd46-064d-497e-ab9c-606f4c5d1072-original.jpeg
Trucker: Here too, but that’s in fall. Just had the X-rated view of a life time. Was at the Great Spirit Bluff peregrine site
[ https://explore.org/livecams/birds/falcon-nest-cam ]. It has 2 webcams, 1 fixed on an arm aimed into the nestbox, the other able to roam. Think both have microphones, because I’ve heard noise of highway and trains. Peregrines don’t build a nest. Roaming camera was peering into box. A peregrine was in the box, and I thought it might be an adult on an egg. The bird then began to call; had heard an occasional scream other times, but this was different: prolonged, interrupted by silences and bird looking out, often with head twisted 90 degrees, one eye thus below the other. Then camera roamed, searching in woods below. Came upon another peregrine perched on a limb, thus seen from above. This one opened its bill some, but I heard no calls. Turns out this was the falcon; the one in the box had been the tercel. Suddenly he appeared, lit on top of her, and presumably inseminated her. Birds have to mate at just the right time, when the yolk is ready but the reproductive tract has not covered it with layers of albumen. Expect there w/b an egg in the box by tomorrow. Hey, that means Jr. was conceived on St. Urho’s Day. Peace,
Thanks to y’all, I was able to amuse a few dozen correspondents by wishing them a happy St. Urho’s Day and NOT explaining same! Several have gotten back to me while expressing their lack of knowledge of the saint – I am also in that group. At least one correspondent spent a lot of her adult life in MN, so may have been exposed. None, to my knowledge, has any Finnish ancestors.
There are 2 eggs each in the Decorah & Decorah North bald eagle nests; 3 eggs in the owlceanside barn owl box. I never knew relatively small barn owls (maybe 12″-15″) could carry/eat such large prey as rabbits, but they do. It was totally amazing to see one such owl swallow an entire rabbit whole! Ya woulda thunk she’d have dissembled it first….