There was snow on the ground, briefly, here in Indianapolis today. Which means its time for what the Hoosier state does best: high school basketball. The girls season kicked off last week, and I had two games. I lukced out and got to see both the teams that are probably our best and which are coached by my favorite coaches. Thursday I had our biggest school, CGHS. This is a school that is very good in almost every sport.
Despite my moratorium on political postings, it is a bit of a tradition for me to wrap up the general election. So here are some observations, thoughts, musings, and what-have-yous. In 2004 I watched the results in our basement, scribbling down thoughts in a notebook and occasionally running upstairs to check things on the computer or send IMs to friend of the blog Dale S. as we tried to figure out how the hell the numbers weren’t breaking our way.
Normally when I vote, I head to the polls, wait my turn, and then cast my ballot. This year, though, I’m going to mix things up. I keep hearing about voter intimidation in some states, and it sounds like something I’d like to learn more about. So today I plan on the following forms of intimidation: Standing extremely close to the person in front of me in line. While doing so I will alternate between ignoring their annoyed looks and moving closer each time they attempt to create more space, and glowering at them with my meanest look possible.
Drift: The Unmooring of American Military Power - Rachel Maddow. I love Rachel Maddow, at least as much as a straight man can love a gay woman. She speaks from a similar political point of view as mine. And I really like her spin on how to run a news/politics TV show: less yelling and screaming and demonizing and more reasonable discussion of the issues of the day. So I was looking forward to her book, in which she advances the argument that we’ve drifted far from how the Founding Fathers intended for our nation to handle its military affairs.
OK, I take it back. One more political post, although I think this one isn’t likely to annoy anyone. We’ve got a ton of political mailings this year, more than any year I can remember. That’s been fueled by a tight race for Dick Lugar’s US Senate seat and a battle for our state senate seat that is very tough thanks to redistricting. In these final days before Election Day the mailers are flooding in.
We had a very successful Halloween here in Casa de B. The sisters hooked up with the neighbors and had matching costumes. The eight year olds went as fairies, the six year olds as princesses, and L. was the knight to protect them all. So she wouldn’t be alone, the neighbors put a little knight shirt on their dog. We loaded up a wagon with supplies1 and hit the streets. It was quite chilly, so we tackled the neighborhood in two shifts.
What follows is, I hope, my only political post of the season. I belong to no organized party. I am a Democrat. Will Rogers I’ve always thought Republicans were better at coming together as a single party than Democrats. Sure, Republicans have plenty of problems within their party, but come Election Day, the anti-tax millionaires from the big cities and the Bible thumping farmers from the county have a much easier time voting for the same candidates than the various wings of the Democratic party.
Taking a few minutes off from tracking Sandy to catch up on the weekend. With a deep sigh after a couple very busy weeks, things can start getting back to normal around here. Last week was parent-teacher conferences/Fall Break at St. P’s. S. attended the sessions with M.’s and C.’s teachers and learned both are doing very well and are delights to have in class but tend to talk too much and not listen when they are instructed to rein in the verbal offerings.
I am a horrible parent. Last night, as the Indiana Fever closed out the WNBA championship series, I let my girls sleep. Years from now, when classmates ask them where they were on that glorious night, they’ll dip their heads and mumble, “My dad didn’t wake me up to watch the game or celebrate.” A terrific weekend, other than that notable failure. One of my 86 sisters-in-law got married, so we had the entire extended clan in town.
Shall we kick off the week by catching up on odds and ends that have accumulated? I think we shall. M. took another step towards big-girlhood a week ago when she got her ears pierced. Our rule has always been there will be no piercings until the girls can take care of them themselves. M. seemed ready for that and after a month of earning them through good behavior, she finally got them.
I finished my latest book over a week ago but hadn’t found the time to write about it yet. I sat down to do it this morning, not yet looking at the calendar. When I was at the bank later at saw the date, I realized there was some part of me that had intentionally held off on writing this entry until today. My mom was born on October 10, 1951.
Some game at Lucas Oil Stadium on Sunday. First there was the result, a fantastic Colts comeback - they trailed 21-3 at halftime and looked awful in the first half - that ended on a missed Green Bay field goal that secured the 30-27 win. There was Reggie Wayne’s epic performance, catching every ball that was anywhere near him. There was Andrew Luck engineering a fantastic drive for the winning touchdown.
I’ve always loved the final day of the baseball season.1 Anyone can go to Opening Day, but it takes a real fan to go to Closing Day when your team is 25 games out and has been since Father’s Day. When the end of the season rolls around, I often think of a year in the late 90s, probably 1998, when a group of us planned to go to the Royals' final home game.
Birthday time in our home again. Today L. leaves the easy ways of three-year-oldom behind for the hard-knocks world that is being four. She’s pretty excited. So who is little L. today? She’s a piece of work, I tell you. She has always had a spark about her that delights pretty much everyone she runs into. There’s a glimmer in her eye, an ease with adults, a desire to report on what’s happening around her, and her ever-present grin that seem to endear her to everyone.
Sometimes the most important questions do not get asked. Or at least they’re asked by the wrong people, never get answered, and fade away. Yesterday, as I knocked out dishes and laundry, I listened to the American Top 40 rerun of the week. It was from September 1985. Good times for me, back then. In my first month of high school, the Royals had just caught and passed the Angels and were on their way to two more comebacks in October.
Bond is back! After a long, long break, I finally dove into Pierce Brosnan’s first turn as Bond, GoldenEye, Tuesday night. Strangely, as I got deeper and deeper into the flick, I realized that I had never seen the entire movie. I’ve seen the beginning many times, and parts of the rest, but there were parts I’m sure I never saw. Weird, because I remember being pretty excited about the new era of Bond back in 1995.
First, quickly, yes I am kicking myself for staying up and watching Sunday Night’s game rather than Monday’s. I only made it about halfway into the third quarter last night, thus missed the replacement ref fiasco I had been hoping for. I say we keep it going! Don’t stop now, Goodell, owners, and referee union. Let’s drag this thing out as long as possible and see just how many ways we can screw up the season!
It isn’t often anymore that I stay up and watch an entire Sunday or Monday Night Football game. Last night was an exception. And it wasn’t just because the game between New England and Baltimore was tremendously important, with the loser taking on a second loss just three weeks into the season. It wasn’t just because, early on, the replacement referees showed they would not be able to keep control of the game.
Two years ago, when M. was learning to read and write, we came across a notebook with some “Direy” entries in it. My favorite entry read: Dear Direy, C. hit me. Love, M. Now that C. is going through the same learning process, we’re finding fun little notes from her. Like this one that was lying on the floor this morning. Translated for universal comprehension, it reads: by C.
After two weeks, I’ll follow the lead of pretty much every other football commentator and make broad assertions based on limited data. Therefore, 2012 will be the Wacky Year. One week teams and players will look great, the next totally lost. See the Cowboys, who went from Super Bowl favorites to Same Old Cowboys in 10 days' time. And Peyton Manning who went from, Back to Normal to ‘Weak Arm, Bad Decisions, Was It A Mistake To Come Back?