Shoulder and Condo update

What to write about today?

Tonight I have softball in the burbs at 8:30 and 9:30, so I'll be home much too late to write tonight. It will be warm out there, but not oppressively hot or muggy at that hour. Should be fun. During the month of June I'll be getting a steady diet of first base while I work on strengthening my arm. Last weekend I was a little disappointed in the strength of my throws. I was really hoping that with the warm weather, my shoulder would magically be back to normal. No such luck. Sigh. Just have to keep working at it.

Manual Labor Mike is close to finishing the last of the doors and trim surrounding the doors which I'm having him upgrade. There were three doors, all downstairs, that were still the bad, dark brown, old wood style. In addition to the doors, I also had him replace some really bad, cheap, dark brown trim and accent pieces near the doors. Instead of doing something elaborate, I'm just going back to drywall there and making it look a little more modern. The changes should continue to lighten up the downstairs. Next projects: master bathroom and replacing some more old bad wood trim around the windows downstairs.

Working on 18 years....I guess

The county sent me a "Long-Time Occupant Exemption Application" the other day. Apparently they are jacking up property taxes but if you have an exemption, the increase is capped. I like the idea! In order to apply though, you have to fill out a rather simple document which asks, in part, when you moved in. Seems simple enough right? It took me almost an hour to find SOME document with a date on it that seemed to verify when I took possession. It seemed like the mortgage papers would be good documentation, but I've refinanced two or three times over the years so that wasn't as easy as it seemed.

Anyway, it seems that I moved in October of 1992. My tax return for 1992 didn't show a deduction for mortgage interest, but 1993 had a full year's worth. Two months of mortgage interest wouldn't make itemizing worth it, so it's circumstantial evidence.

So who are my neighbors? I've lived here for 18 years, surely I know my neighbors right? Well, outside of my building, I know the guy next door is named Joe. He's in his 50's, had a high paying HR job and then got let go. Now he works at Home Depot after not being able to find another job. He's the only person in the building I know. On the other side is an Asian couple and a neo-natal care nurse, but I don't know their names. A guy down the street went to high school with me, but he's moving out of the country. That's about it. Further down the street I know Mike and a couple, oh, and around the corner is Brian and Rochelle. Just seems like I should know more people than that. There are other acquaintances on the block I guess, but not many.

The neighborhood is much more transient than a suburban neighborhood, so maybe it's surprising I know as many people as I do!

Insightless

What a long weekend! Starting with watching the Hawks on Friday night and running through my LOST party tonight, it's been exhausting. Softball on Saturday ran from 9 a.m. (when I left the house) until 9 at night, when I got home. Both the swing and shoulder are getting better, but I realized Saturday that my shoulder is NOT near 100% yet. I just have to be patient and keep working on my throwing consistently until it gets there.

The Hawks won a trip to the Stanley Cup finals and will have home ice advantage regardless of who they play. In an awful moment during the game, one of their defensemen, Duncan Keith, caught a puck in the mouth and lost four teeth. His mouth was understandably swollen in post game interviews, but he came back in to play the entire third period. It just makes you think: what would I do and not do, if I lost four teeth. I tell ya, the list of stuff I WOULDN'T do is pretty damn long and the list of what I would do is pretty short. Wow.

So more insightful entries coming during the week. Hope you had a great weekend too!

Busy couple of days coming up

Tonight I'm heading to the Sox game with LL as part of Legacy Brick Owner night or something to that effect. Those of us who shelled out some coin for a personalized brick outside the stadium had the opportunity to buy half priced tickets and potentially get onto the field for a pre-game parade. Hopefully we'll be part of the first 1800 people and be able to walk around a bit on the field. We'll see!! If we do, I'll post pictures.

Tomorrow is the Blackhawks' game and we might head out to meet some friends and watch the game together.

Saturday morning LL leaves for the east coast for work and I'm going to Crystal Lake to join my other softball team for a tournament. I love playing with the guys on both teams (there is a large overlap) and I like the rules in this organization as well. Heading out there will allow me to get in some practice swings, field some practice balls, get some throws in and get worked into the lineup as the manager deems appropriate. It should be a good day.

Sunday I'm having some people over for the last episode of LOST. I've watched since the beginning and am a big fan. There's a 2 hour special recap from 6-8 and then a 2 1/2 hour finale and then all the stars are on Jimmy Kimmel afterwards. Should be a fun night and busy weekend!!!

Beautiful Sunny Day!

It was a gorgeous day today in Chicago; barely a cloud in the sky and mid 70's. My nose faucet from yesterday finally dried up and I'm pretty sure the Nyquil from last night and the 9 hours of sleep really helped. Still, I was feeling tired and a bit off so thinking was again not a priority. In the afternoon I headed to the gym to sit in the steam room for about 15 minutes. It felt pretty good, but it's surprisingly draining! Unfortunately I passed my cold along to LL and now she's not feeling well. Sigh. Tonight I'll make her dinner in an effort to make up for it a bit!

Last night I headed to Arlington Heights for my weekly softball league. Though I didn't feel great, we didn't have extra players, I needed to throw and to take some swings, so I needed to go. Unfortunately I had to fight through local Cubs traffic, then rush hour traffic and then concert traffic out at the All State Arena. Ugh! It took me almost 90 minutes to get out there, which is what I had allotted, but that meant little warm up time. Throwing went pretty well though, little changed from Saturday. Hitting was unfortunate though. I tried a new bat and I really struggled to hit the ball with any authority in the first game. Remembering that I had a similar problem at one point last year, I switched bats to one I've used in the past. Immediately I started hitting the ball harder and hit a triple in my last at bat. Sometimes a little thing like that can make all the difference.

The Passing of a Restaurant

Around the corner from me is a BYOB Italian restaurant called Adesso. I've written about it before and even included pictures after it opened up. When it first opened, the food was very tasty and the BYOB aspect made it a great deal: high quality tasty food for a relatively low overall price.

In the first six months plus after being opened, I went there for business, on dates and even saw NFL Hall of Famer Marv Levy there with his wife. The place was hopping.

The problems started with a slight degradation of the food. The gnocchi wasn't as fresh, the rolls seemed more processed, the grilled calamari appetizer was changed and less tasty. Then they weren't open for lunch anymore. The crowds were significantly lighter around dinner time. Cheap paper signs went up discussing their "new" menu. More cheap signs talking about how they can cater your party.

Now they have a sign up looking for server help. Why? I'm thinking it's because their staff, which used to be good, have left due to low traffic which means low tips.

I'd be shocked if the restaurant is open come the winter. Normally I love these kinds of restaurants and would go there once a week to help support it, but their food just isn't up to the quality of a lot of other Italian restaurants in the area. The space used to house an Einstein Bagel. Maybe they'll move back in!

Still not 100%

Some elaboration on my weekend's events. Yes, even though I was not feeling well, I went to play 4 softball games on Saturday. Why? Not because I'm some kind of masochist, but because I really needed to test my arm and see some live pitching. The outcome of the games didn't matter a whole lot to us (only 4 people from my team were there, the rest were subs), but how my shoulder felt on Saturday AND on Sunday were important. It went pretty well all in all.

Going to church services in Joliet is not a regular thing for us, but this service was special as LL's mother chose all the music in the service and her father, who sings in the choir, was doing a reading. Normally I'll sing along to songs if I know them and Sunday I knew the songs and was able to bellow out along with the congregation. Church services are always more enjoyable to me when I can sing along with the songs.

Today I wasn't feeling 100% so I took advantage of the day to do more mundane things that didn't involve thinking: laundry, grocery shopping, haircut and going to the gym. Why the latter? Well, often when you play in longer tournaments out of town, you're not feeling 100% for one reason or another, but you still have to go out there and give it your best shot so going to the gym on a day like today should help me mentally during those times if not physically.

Old is new again

Sorry for the silence late last week; work was busy and then I started coming down with something or my allergies were acting up and that wore me down a bit.

Despite all that, on Thursday night we went to a fundraiser for a charity that Ricardo's wife is involved with. Fortunately for all of us, it was right around the corner! Anyway, since I wasn't 100%, I didn't drink too much wine. Friday was a half day of work, thankfully as I was feeling sort of beat up. Well my allergies start kicking in, my body just shuts down. Valiantly I fought it off throughout the afternoon and evening on Friday with.....Indian food!

Yeah, a little odd, but we had dinner plans with a good buddy of mine and his wife. We've been going to a great place up just off of Devon called Bhabi's Kitchen. On Friday we pulled up at the time we were meeting, only to find that Bhabi's was closed!! It was a BYOB and the owner was there as a helpful resource in figuring out what to order. The reason I found Bhabi's in the first place almost two years ago was that LL and I were going to my favorite Indian restaurant, Hema's Kitchen, and upon arrival we found that the entire building was condemned!! A block away was Bhabi's and we were very happy. So Friday night we wondered back onto Devon Avenue to find the next Indian restaurant. After walking west a few blocks, I spotted a marquee that said Hema's Kitchen! They reopened down the street about 4 months after their old building was condemned. How fortunate! We ate and had a very nice meal.

Still struggling with my cold, I got up early on Saturday morning to play in a softball tournament. Most of our team was playing for another team (which I played for also last year), so this tournament was just for some of us to get in some swings and practice and for me to throw. Throwing went well, but I still have to get stronger. It's coming along though. My hitting was awful though, but I chalk that up mostly to my being very tired from not sleeping well.

After spending Saturday night in drinking tea and resting, LL and I got up in the morning to head to her church in Joliet with her parents. After the service we had a nice lunch and watched the Hawks take game one in the playoffs against San Jose. An exciting game!!!

So health-wise, I'm feeling like I could be feeling better tomorrow if I can get a good night's sleep tonight. It didn't seem like a full blown cold, just allergies that kind of threw me off for a few days.

And finally, during the day on Sunday, my 2002 Toyota Camry rolled over 100,000 miles. I've always said that I was going to keep the car for 10 years or until it go to 100,000 miles at least. At this point, I can see having the car for two more years pretty easily.

Short, but sweet

In anticipation of my more structured working environment today through Friday, I hit the gym on Monday (ran 2 1/2 miles again and upped my speed) and again on Tuesday. My workout on Tuesday consisted of 18 exercises of 20-30 reps, depending on the exercise. It was pretty exhausting, but also felt very good. Softball was cancelled due to rain, so I wasn't going to have a chance to throw unless I thought outside the box. Since I didn't want to throw for very long, I didn't want to have someone come across town for 15 minutes of throwing.

The solution? After driving around and not finding a suitable place, I parked my car in my parking spot, grabbed my mitt and ball and walked down the street to a bigger parking lot. This one had a chain-link fence all the way around it, so I found a good spot and started throwing the ball against the fence. It worked pretty well and I got 25 or so throws in. The shoulder felt great!! Saturday I'll be playing in a tournament with a make-shift team, but I'll be able to get some swings and throws in without much on the line. Should be a great test.

WWJD?

The other day I was walking down the street and saw a car with the rear driver side window broken out. It was a white Saturn Ion with Michigan plates. Unfortunately, it's not an all that uncommon site in Chicago. It was mid-morning and the weather was nice, but that evening it was supposed to rain. WWJD? What Would Joe Do? What would you do?

Since it's happened to me (twice), I decided to see if I could track down the car owner and notify them of the problem. I started with 311, the non-emergency all purpose and police number. They patched me through to a cop fairly quickly and I told him what I knew. He said since the car was out of state, they probably wouldn't be able to track him down so the best thing to do was wait and hope the owner returned to the car fairly soon. Clearly this was a jaded cop who didn't want to help anymore than necessary. Would it be hard to track the owner down? Well getting the owner's name, home address and phone number would have taken the cop, at most, 5 minutes. They have a database for the plate info, which would have the address and with that info even I could get the phone number. Why not try? Because you're a probably fat-ass, lazy cop working the phone lines and are unhappy about it. Ugh.

Wanting to get SOME progress at least, I tried AAA. I figure a bunch of people are members and maybe this person is as well. AAA doesn't have the license plate info, though they directed me to the State of Michigan site where I could find who owns the car and they were right, but it would cost me $25-$95 . Ugh again.

That's as far as I got. Maybe trying a few insurance companies: State Farm, All State and Geico would have covered a bunch of people, but I ran out of time and I'm not sure they would have license plate info either, though I think they would have.

Anyway, the owner did not return that evening and it did indeed rain. The owner didn't come back the next day either. Or the next. Finally, over the weekend, the car was moved. Sorry driver....I tried!

Hitting the 'Ville

Tonight, I headed out to Naperville to celebrate a belated Mother's Day with my mom and dad and LL. LL came out straight from work as it's much easier to head west from her work than it is to head east back to the city. Plus traffic is just a nightmare around Chicago these days.

The trip took me 90 minutes, but it was worth it to take my folks out to dinner. There are tons of restaurants to choose from in Naperville now, but we hit the old reliable Catch 35. The food was delicious and we had a very nice time. The drive home was considerably quicker, but it makes for a long night.

More work tomorrow and then some late night softball. I really need to start throwing, so I'm going to do it tomorrow night in our regular league play, provided the weather cooperates.

ESDNM comes to town on Wednesday, which is going to throw a wrench into my workout schedule, my eating plans, my time with LL, basically my entire life. I'll survive though.

Happy Mother's Day to everyone....even you muthas.

Up and down weekend. The passing of Ernie Harwell still had me down a bit. On Friday though, my spirits were lifted with a trip to a new restaurant Chilam Balam, a Mexican restaurant that serves sort of tapas style. It's BYOB and the food was really good, but we did have to wait an hour. Normally I wouldn't do that, but we were with another couple and there was a bar next door. Afterwards, we watched a great Blackhawks' game and win where they went up 3 games to 1 in the series. Hockey playoffs are an exciting time of year. A good run at the gym early in the day helped to pick me up a bit too.

Saturday rolled around and I was going to go hit softballs and do some throwing, but the temps plummeted and I decided it was not a good idea to try and throw when it was so cold. It was such a blah weather day that I didn't even feel like going to the gym. So after a relaxing day, LL and I went downtown to The Chicago theater to see Joel McHale. If you don't know who he is, he's on NBC on the show Community and on The Soup on The E! Network. He was really very funny. Prior to the show, we hooked up for a few drinks with the kids of the guy who sits next to me at the Bears games.

On Sunday, we started the day with a late breakfast (an omelet) and then back to the gym for a good strengthening workout. Then I finally got in touch with my mother to wish her a happy Mother's Day and LL's parents came downtown for dinner. We took them to Sapori Trattoria and had the usual great meal, though it was SUPER crowded and fairly noisy in the back room, which I didn't even know existed! Otherwise though it was a great meal.

We came home and watched the Blackhawks' game which I Tivoed. Unfortunately, they lost 4-1, but trailed 3-0 for a good portion of the game. Ugh. The game was at home and with the Hawks up 3 games to 1, they could wrap up the best of seven series. With the loss, they have to go to Vancouver on Tuesday. If they don't win there, then they come back to Chicago for game 7 on Thursday here in Chicago. Several problems with all of this. First, the next opponent should the Hawks win, San Jose, have already finished their series and are resting comfortably. They'll have almost a week off by the time they play their next game. The Hawks could have as little as one or two days off before starting the next series.....IF they win! Ugh. Plus, San Jose has home ice advantage regardless of who they play, so they'll start off at home. Another west coast flight for the Hawks. They REALLY need to win on Tuesday.

AND, I just bought tickets to a wine tasting fundraiser on Thursday. Isn't that the way??

The Story of How I Met Ernie Harwell

Ernie's last call before retiring, in 2002 at Comerica Park: "Swing and a miss," describing a pitch to Tigers first baseman Carlos Pena. After a break, Harwell returned and said thanks to the fans for "taking me to the cottage up north, to the beach, the picnic, your workplace and your backyard. Thank you for sneaking your transistor under the pillow as you grew up loving the Tigers. God has a new adventure for me."

His comments really sum up well how we all got to know Ernie while growing up in Michigan.

Here's the story of how I was able to meet Ernie and his wife:

Sometime in the early 2000's, I bought a bat autographed by all of the 1968 World Series champion Detroit Tigers, except for Ray Oyler who passed away in 1981. My father and brother-in-law also each bought one of the limited edition bats. It remains the highlight of my extensive memorabilia collection, but I thought it was incomplete without Ernie's autograph as well, so I wrote the following letter in care of the Detroit Free Press:

ERNIE HARWELL August 15, 2005

c/o Detroit Free Press

Dear Mr. Harwell,

In 1968 I was 2 years old, but I’ve seen tapes of the World Series games and even a documentary on the season. I’m told that I watched all of the games on television, but that’s taking the word of my father, dubious at best.

Even though I now live in Chicago, until the age of 10 I lived in an around Detroit (Pleasant Ridge and Fenton in addition to Detroit proper). So growing up, you were the voice of baseball for me. When the Tigers celebrated your retirement a few years ago, I had the honor of signing the paper banner. If you still have it, I’m on it somewhere!

The reason I’m writing is that I’m a baseball card and other sports memorabilia collector. Three years ago or so, I was fortunate enough to find a bat autographed by most of the 1968 Detroit Tigers (I guess a few hundred of these were autographed at the same time). To me, the bat is incomplete without your autograph on it. I’m hoping you would know the best way for me to track where you’ll be signing autographs so that I can make the trip to Detroit. Do you have any ideas? Possibly through your agent? I really don’t know. My efforts thus far have not been effective.

I appreciate your help Mr. Harwell. Thanks again for the wonderful childhood memories!!!

A few weeks later, in response to my letter, Ernie sent the letter I've scanned here along with his home address. His HOME address! Who does that?? AND a hand written note! But that's the kind of guy he was.

So in response, I sent the following letter a month later or so:

Ernie Harwell November 5, 2005

(address omitted)

Dear Mr. Harwell,

Thank you so much for writing me back regarding autographing my 1968 Detroit Tigers bat. I was very excited to receive your letter (handwritten no less!!) back in September. While I was hoping that I would make it to Detroit possibly for the Bears/Lions game, business responsibilities took priority and wouldn’t allow for the trip. The White Sox threw an 88 year wrench into my schedule as well, but that was definitely worth it. I was able to see a first round game and game 1 of the World Series in person. It was wonderful.

In mentioning to some sports friends of mine about my intention to visit, they brought up the possibility that you may be headed out of town for the winter. In addition, the holiday season is busy for everyone, so you may already be booked up doing family things. I’d still love to get out there to meet you, possibly take you to dinner (anywhere you’d like to go if you’re so inclined) and to have my bat autographed.

The first few weeks of December seem viable and the Redwings are in town. The first few weeks in January also look wide open to me. Please let me know what might fit your schedule best.

I’ve included some additional contact information below by the way. Sorry about the typewritten letter…..believe me, you wouldn’t be able to read my handwriting!!

Sincerely,

(Here I included my contact information.)

About a week or ten days later, on a Monday morning, I got dressed and headed down to Starbucks for my morning cup of coffee as I do everyday without fail (it is an addiction after all). This particular morning, around 8, the phone rang just as I had opened the door to leave. Normally I would have just let it go to voicemail and then gone to get my coffee, but I decided to at least see who it was. Hmmm, a Detroit area code. I don't remember now if it said "Harwell" on my caller ID or not, but it may have. Anyway, I picked it up and through the line came the unmistakable voice of Ernie Harwell. I was almost speechless.

Ernie simply said "Hello Mr. Sutton, this is Ernie Harwell." as if I didn't know immediately. He went on to say that I should just give him a call whenever I was planning on coming to town and that we would figure something out. And that's what I did in the summer of 2006.

The White Sox were playing in Detroit in mid July during the week, so it was pretty easy to get tickets and I figured it would be a great chance to get together with Ernie. So I actually called him up and asked if he would like to get together for lunch on one of the days that I would be in town. Since I was able to get some really good seats behind home plate, I decided to see if Ernie might want to go to the game with me. He said he didn't go to games anymore, but that lunch would be just fine. Awesome! We discussed a location and we were all set.

The Monday before the Wednesday trip, the phone rang and Ernie was on the other end. "Joe? This is Ernie Harwell." I'll never forget how he would say that. Turns out his publicist had scheduled a bigwig from NY for lunch and he would not be able to make it. Ugh. It was too good to be true. Then he asked if we could have dinner instead!!! Absolutely!!!

Instead of meeting him at the restaurant, I actually picked him and his wife up at their assisted living home. He still didn't know me from Adam, but he was more than happy to have me drive them over to the restaurant, Steve and Rocky's. As each employee came over to say hi and pay their respects, he made sure to make introductions. So courteous!! Dinner went on for over two hours and he was more than happy to sign my bat a few other things I brought along, including an Ernie Harwell bobblehead doll. To make the bats even more special, I had his wife Lulu sign them as well. She was pretty excited to do it.

So that's the story of how I met Ernie Harwell. When I went back to Detroit last summer to see the Cubs play, I set up dinner again and he was more than accommodating. It turns out, the day before he had lunch with the broadcasters from the Cubs. Lunch with them but dinner with me!! Nice!

A few weeks later, Ernie was diagnosed with a inoperable bile duct cancer. He faced the news bravely and said he would spend his remaining days taking care of his wife and would live as long as God allowed. Eight months to the day later, Tuesday, he passed away in the company of his wife and family at that same assisted living home in which I picked him up a few years ago. Rest in peace Ernie.

Goodbye Ernie. You are already missed and will never be forgotten.

Yesterday ended up being a sad day for me as I was informed of the news of the passing of Hall of Fame announcer Ernie Harwell. Thank you for those who have already expressed their condolences and who called or emailed to let me know of the sad news. Here's a link to a pretty good story and tribute to Ernie. Though I haven't documented my initial meeting with Ernie in my blog (the whole process took place the year before I started my blog), I did write about our second dinner last summer.

How do I convey what Ernie meant to not only me, but literally millions of fans who listened to him over the 40 years he announced Tigers baseball? He was a constant in my childhood and mostly during the best of times; the summer. Whether listening to the radio at home or on TV (sometimes as he mostly did radio), or on the way up to Beaver Island in the car to pass the time while driving, or actually on the Island with my dad's huge radio which could just barely still pick up the broadcast, listening to Ernie's voice was always a calming constant. Even when we moved to Naperville when I was 10, I could still pick up the broadcasts on clear nights and would listen to his voice come across the crackling airwaves before falling asleep.

I've never espoused that any sports figure should be a child's idol and Ernie wasn't mine as a kid. It wasn't until the last five years or so that I actually got to "know" Ernie and what kind of man he was. If there ever was a guy who COULD be a sports figure for children to idolize, Ernie was absolutely that man. A gentleman, a story teller, very polite and a great conversationalist.

Tomorrow I'll write about how I got to know Ernie. Thanks for the memories Mr. Harwell!

Justification

It's May 4th. M-A-Y PEOPLE!!!! What the hell happened to the first four months of the year. One third of an entire year has passed since New Year's. What do I have to show for it?? Pretty much nothing. Ok, that can't actually be right. Let's do an inventory of what I've accomplished the last four months to somewhat justify my existence on the planet.

1) Trip to Switzerland. Can't argue with that. Good times.

2) Eating much healthier now by regularly eating acorn and butternut squash, broccoli, sweet potatoes and a spinach salad, not to mention usually tuna for lunch. Also, I cook with olive oil more regularly than before.

3) Almost fully recovered from shoulder surgery. This is the biggee I guess. I've been going to the gym 3-5 days a week for the last two months, including running 3 days a week for the last three weeks or so.

4) Had three doors replaced and installed downstairs in my condo, plus I have a plan to revamp the look further. Should be nice.

5) Moved a lamp downstairs so I have fewer lights on while working, using less energy and burning less bulbs.

6) Continuing on the green front, I started recycling one of the two Starbucks cups that I used to use each day along with the lid and heat sleeve. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find a good travel mug that doesn't leak at least periodically.

7) Working on an invention that I can't talk about, but it's a pretty good idea and I have it prototyped already.

8) Found a way to save $4k on my taxes by simply opening a Solo 401(k) plan instead of just contributing to my SEP. Nice! Almost pays for my Bears tickets!

So I guess that's something at least. Still, time just flies.....

You get what you pay for

First, my mom pointed out, correctly, that I spent 21 years in one place other than my current neighborhood: home. She couldn't be more right! Though we moved around, it was always home.

Second, another good day at the gym where I ran 2.5 miles again, which is fairly standard now, but I did it while being pretty tired and feeling a bit off. It's good to be able to power through those low energy levels. It really felt like I wasn't going to make it just after I started.

Third, I went to Whole Paycheck to pick up some kind of meat for dinner. I have to say, not only are the workers at WP nicer and more helpful than Jewel or Treasure Island, but the people who shop there seem nicer. Twice people were otherwise distracted and they almost walked into me or cut me off and both apologized profusely. Very nice.

Half of 44 is.....half my life

After church today, I noticed that even though my church is only 8-10 blocks west, it was noticeably warmer there than at my condo a block and a half off the lake. Odd. But I should be used to that by now right? Every spring and summer I hear the same bad four words: cooler near the lake. Granted, in the winter it is slightly warmer near the lake as well, but that's usually relative to the suburbs, not a mile inland.

Anyway, it got me thinking about why the temperature difference was even odd to me. It certainly shouldn't be because as of this summer, I have lived in the neighborhood 22 years. Twenty-two years. That's half my life! I've lived in this neighborhood longer than I've lived anywhere. That's a bit scary. It doesn't feel like it at all. The area has changed pretty dramatically and even with the drop in home prices, I've made a ton of money on my home. Not that I want to move anytime soon. Heck, I'm still rehabbing various parts of the place. Next on the list is the master bathroom by the way.

Wait, it's only been 21 years. Damnit.

Quick Saturday entry

The Hawks play shortly, so I'm going to make a quick entry today to make up for missing yesterday.

Today my softball team had a tournament out in Arlington Heights, about 50 minutes away or so. On the line, a world series bid for the ISA tournament in Tampa in September. Since I'm still rehabbing my shoulder, I was just going to fill in as manager: make the lineup, shift players around, keep scorebook, whatever else needs to be done. Though were were supposed to have 12 players there for the first two games, one guy called in sick and another just didn't show up (I guess he was iffy to begin with). We have 10 guys in the field, so it was just me on the bench when we were in the field.

Our first game was a knock down, drag out fight that was 20-19 going into the last inning and we were up. We broke through and scored 5 to go up by 6 and shut them down to win a big game. There actually is a guy on the team slower than me, so I was the "base burglar" who could go in once per inning and run for someone, but could not otherwise play in the game. So I actually contributed and scored some runs!!

In game two, we came out flat and stayed flat in a 13-3 loss to a team who was one level above us in this organization, but whom we've beaten many times. Oh well.

Trouble came in game three as we lost one player who had a prior engagement. Since we had no subs, I had to go in and play first!! Fortunately I had taken batting practice in the morning and ground balls as well, so I wasn't completely rusty, though I hadn't faced live pitching for 5 months! Anyway, I went 3-4 (including 2-2 in the last decisive inning) as we won 20-10 in 5 innings. We went into that 5th inning trailing 10-9, but scored 11 to end it by the slaughter rule. As it turns out, I was the winning run!!

In our final game, we played another team one level above us and we jumped to a 2-0 and then 4-0 lead. They clawed back to make it 4-1 and then 4-3 in the 5th before scoring 5 runs to make it 8-4. We got two runs back in the 6th to make it 8-6, but couldn't muster anymore runs in the 7th and lost by that score. I was only 1-3, but hit the ball hard twice.

As the highest finishing team at our level, we won two bats and a birth in the World Series in Tampa!! Yay!!!!

Stories I've read recently

The other day I saw a story on the news about the waste involved with the Yellow Pages, White Pages, Yellow Book and other phone books. Seriously, other than as a booster seat for a kid, when was the last time you actually used a phone book?? Anyway, it turns out that you can opt-out of receiving them. Here's the opt out links for Yellow Book and Dex Knows Yellow Pages.

There was a good story in the Tribune today about salt intake, but I couldn't find a link to the actual story. However, I did find this link to the L.A. Times graphic which was pretty interesting as well.

Why are Americans so unhealthy? Start with this story and then go to this story. Pretty much sums it up!

How about a standing ovation?

The IOC stripped the 2000 Chinese women's gymnastics team of their bronze medal because one of the women on their team was 14 instead of the required minimum age of 16. The fourth place team who now gets the bronze? The USA!!! Whoop-whoop!!! I want NBC to interrupt programming and show the US team getting their bronze medals somewhere on a podium and with the national anthem playing. That would be awesome.

Today I put in another 2.5 miles on the treadmill and felt pretty good doing it. Next week I start going to PT only one day a week and Tuesday nights I'm going to drive to the burbs to start fielding and throwing with my team and maybe taking some batting practice or some swings. Saturday I'm going to manage the team in a tournament and field and throw throughout the day as we play. Hopefully my arm strength will start coming back soon.

So the Bears have it right?

Few times in my over 1,000 posts have I lauded the actions of the Bears management. Time and time again, they've drafted poorly, developed little talent and seen players go elsewhere to be successful. That hasn't necessarily changed, but maybe, just maybe the big boat that is the lousy management of the Bears is starting to change directions.

To wit, last year they traded for what they believed to be (and who might be) a franchise quarterback. Without a first or second round pick this year, they picked up the consensus top defensive end available, a solid running back (which they took from a division opponent no less) and a highly touted blocking tightend to fit their new offensive coordinator. Today they traded a linebacker, where they have a surplus, for a safety, where they have a need. Both players were quality, but you have to give value to get value.

So I asked myself, who are these guys? They seem to be addressing needs and doing so relatively intelligently. Or am I missing something?

On the opposite side of the argument, they traded their second round pick for a defensive end who then up and died. Bad luck or bad scouting? That franchise quarterback will now be playing under his third offensive coordinator in three years. That's difficult on any quarterback. They let a quality defensive end go (who ended up signing for the Super Bowl champs for 1/2 the money the Bears would have had to pay) and believe they can replace him with people from the team last year who rotated in and out of the lineup. Then there is their firm belief in their woefully under skilled receiving corps.

I think they are still the same dumb group of people who have happened to do some things right. Sadly, them doing ANYTHING right makes it seem like they've turned things around when in reality they are still behind the eight ball. Every team in the division got much better during the offseason or at least stayed at a level above the Bears. It could be a long year!

*******An Addendum*******

It turns out that the Carolina Panthers had told Chris Harris, the safety for whom we traded, that they were going to release him if a trade couldn't be worked out. A released player can sign with anyone with no compensation to his prior team. So the Bears could have picked him up for NOTHING!! This is what the Saints did with Alex Brown when we couldn't trade him after saying we would release him if we couldn't trade him.

Now the Bears had no guarantee that they could sign Harris, however, a little homework on their part would have revealed that he still lives in Gurnee!!! Of course he would have come back here. Ugh. Maybe it is the same old' Bears.

Today they traded another safety to the Rams for a draft pick next year, though they didn't disclose for what round pick. I'm guessing it's a 4th, but could be a 5th. Ugh again, not that I was a huge fan of the safety they traded.

Monday = Holiday

Not a holiday from work, but a holiday from working out. It's nice to have a day off! Tomorrow I head back for more therapy, my last week with two sessions. After this week I'll go back to just once a week as I want to save some PT dollars in case I need them later in the year.

Anyone know a good eggplant recipe? There's always really good looking eggplant at the grocery store and I never buy it because I don't know how to cook it.

Today I had a similar question regarding swordfish. Anyone know a good recipe and do you like swordfish? The guy at Whole Paycheck said it tastes sort of like chicken.

Mediocre news?

Where to start??

First, I actually threw a softball this weekend!! Saturday I headed down to Joliet to see my teammates and make my first throws in almost 5 months. Unfortunately it was rainy and we couldn't find a place to take batting practice, so I didn't get to take swings. My throwing was ok, but I was hoping to be surprised on the upside. While I was hoping to be at 85-90%, I was really more like 65-70%. That was a little disappointing, but it just means I need to actually do more throwing before I'll be ready to play. Before the first game I was able to field some ground balls though and that went well. It was like riding a bike.

On the weight loss front, I tipped the scales at a weight I haven't seen since last November, so that's good. On Thursday after I had made some weight progress, my therapist said that 90% of weight loss is diet. The statement was reinforced when I realized I burned less than 400 calories while running for 2.5 miles. That's a lot of work for not a ton of return in calorie burning, but it's one of the BEST ways to burn them. Anyway, I'm down 4-5 pounds and I'd like to lose another 4-5.

Some incredibly exciting sporting events in Chicago this weekend. The biggee was the Blackhawks victory over the Nashville Predators on Saturday afternoon. They tied the game with 13 seconds left in regulation, then killed off 4 minutes of power play time to start the overtime and scored the game winner less than 10 seconds after the penalty was over. Great theater. The Sox and Cubs both swept as well! The Sox had consecutive walk off home runs to win two of their games.

Friday night, we went to dinner with a softball buddy of mine and his extremely nice wife who just turned 40. It was a good meal and then we had drinks afterwards before heading home. Remembering that 400 calories means another half hour on the treadmill, I took it easy on the food and beer. It was tough though as Saturday was a going away party for Aussie Rick and Deb. They are moving back to Australia next month, but are taking the long route via: an Alaskan cruise, 5-7 days in Hawaii, another week or two in Japan and China before actually getting back to Australia. Nice!

Good Food

Had another solid run at the gym today and am holding onto my 3 pound weight loss. I really only need to lose 5-10 pounds, so this first 3 is important. My physical therapist told me yesterday that she had read that weight loss is 90% diet and 10% exercise. If you think about it, it makes sense. Today I ran for 25 minutes and cooled down for 5 and burned 400 calories. That's a couple of beers or bowls of cereal! Not much.

The weight I've dropped was hard to get off first and I think it's because I was building up muscle tissue at the same time. So while I was burning some fat probably, I was also putting on some of the muscle I had lost over the last four months. That's fine though because that muscle also BURNS more calories, so it's good to build it up.

With LL cooperating, we've been having some really tasty, healthy meals. We start every meal with a spinach salad with cucumbers or tomatoes. Then we've been having either sweet potatoes or butternut or acorn squash, just delicious. We've also had portobella mushrooms on the grill, pork chops, scallops, or steak. Quantity is important and so is quality. It's easy to eat well when the food tastes good!!

Late Start, Could be Bad.

The Blackhawks started their post-season play on Friday the 16th, even though their last game of the season was on Sunday the 11th (I know because I was there). Every other playoff series started on Wednesday or Thursday and only the Hawks started on Friday. Now that they are in a dogfight with the Nashville Predators (down 2-1), I'm thinking about what happens if they pull the series out and move onto the second round. They have to go at least to game six at this point and likely will have to go to game seven if they win at all. Their late start and long first round though, might cost them a day or two of rest going into the second round. Sure, they COULD have won four games straight and it wouldn't be a problem, but they didn't and it could be an issue for them. Just interesting to me that only ONE team started later than everyone else.

Yesterday was my running day and I decided to step it up a notch. Though I kept my speed at the lower speed (10% below what I was running at last Fall), I decided to up my time running from 20 to 25 minutes, a 25% increase. For three one minute intervals, I went back to my faster pace. The run went really well! The increased time, not coincidentally, resulted in a 25% increase in distance too. Good stuff!!!

(In)vested

Most of my adult life I have owned vests. Not like hunting vests or anything, just vests that you throw on when it's a little chilly, but you don't need a coat. Actually, I haven't been sure when the hell you wear these things. Mind you, I've owned probably....10 vests over the last 20 years. Pullovers, zippers, golfing vests, more insulated, less insulated....all kinds. Most of them I've won or be given through golf events of some kind. This year, finally, I've found the beauty of the vest. The weather has been in the low 50's and the vest is perfect with a warm shirt to keep me completely warm enough. A coat or jacket is still in my repertoire, believe me, but I've been wearing a zipper up vest which I received for Christmas I believe, and it's pretty dang nice.

Either this weekend or next weekend, I'll be hitting the softball field to catch some ground balls, do some more light throwing and hopefully hit off a tee. Let's hope the weather (and my shoulder) cooperates!!!

Some Good and Some Bad

Think all athletes are steroid using cheaters? Certainly not I hope, but you might not believe how honest some athletes can be. It happens in golf more than any other sport and it happened a week ago Sunday which cost this guy $400k and his first tournament victory.

Have you seen the new commercials for The Olive Garden? The Olive Garden chefs went to

The Olive Garden cooking school in Tuscany to "learn the art of Italian cooking". There they developed a new dish using super fresh ingredients and came up with the new Fonduta line. Fonduta? What a stupid effing name. Here's the nutritional information for this artistic Italian cooking.

Calories

Total Fat (g)

Sat. Fat (g)

Sodium (mg)

Carbohydrates (g)

Fiber (g)

	Grilled Steak Fonduta	1100	58	33	2220	69	10
	Grilled Chicken Fonduta	1080	57	28	1680	70	5

Holy crap! Look at that sodium content, much less the fat content. The OG continues its rampage on its own customers.

Crazy hectic Monday

Missed my post last night, but topped it off with missing a 7 a.m. meeting this morning because I set my alarm for an hour later than necessary. I blame the hectic Monday I experienced. It seemed like it was going to be fine, but then blew up.

Around 10 a.m. I left the house to get a car wash, the first of several errands I needed to do before a noon meeting at the local branch of a national charity. If you get your car in before 10:30, it's only $7. When I arrived at the car wash, I was greeted with a line of cars 5 deep and a sign that reminds me I have to be "in the building" at 10:30 to get the discount. Fortunately I just made it in, got the car all clean looking and headed to the emissions center.

Every other year or so I have to get the car tested at the emissions center. It passed with flying colors and the process was quick. Then a stop and the bank and post office and it was time for my meeting. They serve lunch during the meeting, so that was covered too.

An hour and fifty minutes into the two hour meeting, it was brought up that the budget for next year beginning in July was short a half million dollars and they were looking to me as the investment subcommittee chair, to reallocate our investments to maximize interest and cover the short fall, though they didn't want to do anything crazy. They basically wanted me to triple the interest income!! Ugh. Thanks for the heads up guys.

Right after the meeting, I headed out to the burbs to pick up LL's dog from her parents who are heading out of town themselves. The hand-off went smooth and I was back home by 5. Unfortunately, that's when my work started. There was a flurry of emails with the charity CFO not to mention catching up on communications for the day. I headed to bed early, but messed up with the alarm....and so starts my Tuesday.

Boy, that's gotta suck

Another gorgeous weather weekend in Chicago without a cloud in the sky Saturday or Sunday. Unfortunately, the skies are not as clear everywhere as you are probably all to aware. Imagine that you've trained, potentially for years, to run in the Boston Marathon, but when it comes time to head to Boston, you get stuck in the airport because a volcano in Iceland erupts. How crazy awful!!

All eight playoff hockey series went to one game a piece after two games. That means that the home team lost the home ice advantage in every single series! Insane! Washington, the #1 team in the East and The President Trophy winner for having the best record in the regular season, had to come back three times before they could get the win in OT against the #8 seeded Candiens who only got into the playoffs by the skin of their teeth. What an exciting game!

So this weekend I tried to enjoy the sun as much as possible, despite the somewhat chilly temps and went to the gym both days. My new plan is to take one day off, go to therapy two days a week, lift weights at least twice and run three days. So some PT days I might lift or I might run. Depends on how it goes. The good news? Monday looks like the best day to take off!!

....ashes to ashes, we all fall down! (or don't take off)

In case you wanted to see graphically what area is being affected by the Iceland volcanic ash, I found this link today which I thought was pretty useful. Hit the next button and you can see the areas affected on different days and different times.

Ugh.

Well, I had a great topic earlier in the evening to write about, but then I went drinking and to watch the Blackhawk's game. They lost 4-1 with two empty net goals, so I'm a bit down. Ugh.

Today I ran for 2 miles again and took a nice sphitz. Not sure if that's how you spell it, but it's basically sitting in a steam room for a bit. Anyway, it was a good workout and tomorrow I go back to the gym to hit the weights. With PT, I'm now working out 4 days a week in an effort to 1) get back into softball shape and 2) lose some weight. While I was essentially immobilized after surgery, my mouth was apparently NOT immobilized as I put on about 5 pounds. At the end of last year I wanted to LOSE 5 pounds, so that puts me 10 pounds overweight now. Crap. Well, I'm working on it!!

This weekend is the first softball tournament that I actually would have wanted to play in. It's in Rockford which is 90 minutes away, but the weather is nice and the guys on that team are pretty fun (I actually play on two teams, but a lot of guys play on both teams). The fields there are decent as I recall, which is why I would want to play. Oh well, next month seems like a sure thing for my return. In both PT and after PT, I've been able to do some light tossing with balls of various weights (4 lbs in PT and basically a tennis ball afterwards). It's all good!

Happy Tax Day

Well, I hope you all got your taxes filed by today or at least filed for an extension. Happily, I did the latter as usual. Could I have got them done in time and reviewed? Sure. But really, what's the point? Since I pay estimated taxes, even if I'm getting a refund, it just lowers the amount that I turn over. Much less stress this way and if I'm anything, I'm all about reducing stress.

Had lunch today with a woman who used to work with me at Morningstar some.....15 years ago or so. It was one of my few experiences of having a meal with little kids. She's got a 5 and 3 year old who are both very good kids, but they are kids. It was really tough to have any type of in depth conversation about anything when the kids were not eating, not chewing, not drinking, drinking too much, throwing crayons, not coloring, coloring things other than the coloring book, etc. She handled them pretty well though and I realized I'm pretty far away from mentally being able to handle two kids at once. Probably after you have one kid, you get used to what you need to do and the second isn't as difficult as it seems. She did give me the advice to travel and do whatever I wanted BEFORE I have kids, because they pretty much just take over.

It was another beautiful 80+ degree day here and that's outstanding for April. It seems like last year we didn't get an 80 degree day until July!!

Go Cubs, Go!

Today, despite being the day before my taxes are due (or before I have to file my extension), I headed to the Cubs game. Normally I don't go to any game in April because the weather just sucks. Yeah, yeah, I know the weather is far colder for Bears games, but something about watching baseball in cold weather rubs me the wrong way. Maybe it's because I don't like to PLAY baseball in the cold either, but playing football in the cold never really bothered me.

Fortunately, the weather was killer awesome today!! It started off a bit cold, but it warmed up nicely and I didn't even need a coat. In fact, I may have gotten a bit of a sun burn! Since our seats were in the shade, the burn happened BEFORE the game. My buddy and I were meeting at Goose Island Brewery, so I got there early and got a table on the patio out back. It was still about 2 hours before the game, so I had my pick of tables and chose one in the sun for maximum warmth. It backfired a bit as I got too warm and had to take off my shirt and go with just my undershirt for a while.

Here's the set up at Goose Island and my first beer. Yum.

And here is the view from our seats. Nice! Third row in the upper deck. Cubbies won 7-6 in a great come from behind win in which they scored 4 runs in the 8th!

Financial Pundit?

Though I thought I wrote about making a move in the stock market, it appears that I did not. Or at least I couldn't find it. It would have been back in November though. Anyway, at that time, I sold some of my stock mutual funds and moved into bonds (moving down to 65-70% stocks). My reasoning was two-fold: 1) the stock market was at 10,600 and I had no reason why given the bad news in the economy. 2) One of the funds I was selling the most of was up 50+%. So how did that turn out for ol'Joe? The Dow dropped to 10,000 and then jumped 10% to 11,000 over the first quarter. The fund I sold was up 6.5%.

Back in January, a stock I was holding, Fastenal (FAST), had run up to $46 a share and had a short ratio of over 20. That means a lot of people were betting that the stock was going to go down. Usually a stock would have a short ratio of 1-7, depending on the amount of news about it, so 20 seemed crazy! So I sold the stock and it dropped to $40 and I looked smart. Then it started climbing again and the short interest backed off to a more reasonable multiple of 10 times the average daily trading volume. Now the stock is north of $53 and again the short ratio is over 20. Their first quarter earnings were up 15% and thus Joe has failed again!!

So next time you call me or email me for financial advice, consider the source!

Busy Day

Interesting day today with the Cubs home opener drawing large crowds to the neighborhood, including a fellow softballer and person for whom I do some consulting work. He was meeting his wife to go to the game (she was coming from work), so we went for a very traditional pre-baseball meal: falafel. He has some dietary restrictions and I just happen to know a place that makes it fresh.

While they went to the game, I hit the gym and stepped up my cardio workout on the treadmill a few tenths of a mile per hour. Got through 2 miles in good shape and went to lift some weights. Tomorrow is my PT session, so I didn't push too hard on the weights, at least on anything I'd be doing tomorrow anyway.

After the game, my guests came back to my place and when LL got back from work, we all went for sushi. Good stuff!

Though the day was busy, I did manage to fit in an episode of Barney Miller from 1976 in which they needed to get flu shots due to an epidemic. The type of flu? Swine flu!! No kidding!! Back in 1976. I didn't recall ever hearing before last year. Maybe that's why "they" wanted us to call it H1N1 instead of swine flu. Or maybe that was the pork lobbyists.

While catching the weather at the end of the day on our local Fox affiliate, WFLD channel 32, from the some-time-poster Amy Freeze, there were some disturbing comments thrown out by the peanut gallery surrounding my tv. As it was only LL and me, you can guess where the comments came from. "How do we know she's even qualified to do the weather? Where's her degree? She's probably lying." Hurtful comments. I apologize on LL's behalf Amy. No hard feelings! I'll let her apologize in person when we take our tour. No date has been set yet, but Katie, you're in! Probably only 5 more spots to fill.

Sort of a Return

Had a pretty fun weekend which was capped off with going to the Blackhawks and Redwings game at the United Center. We went early enough to park for free on the street about 15 minutes away and had a nice walk to the stadium. LL used to live down there, so it was really just parking west of an area she knows pretty well. Since we arrived early enough, we were able to get the free hat they were passing out. In the three games we've gone to in the last 45 days, we got two hats and a bobble head doll!! Good times.

Since we're both trying to eat a bit healthier as well, we opted to have a late brunch which meant we wouldn't eat anything at the 2:00 game. Now, we did have some frosty beverages at the game, but we still have to live!!!

Saturday we took a drive out to Arlington Heights (45 minutes to an hour away depending on traffic) to where my softball team was playing in a tournament. For many of the guys, it was the first time I've seen them since my last tournament in Vegas before my surgery. Some of them I saw at our Super Bowl fundraiser. It was good to see them and I even hopped on the field to coach third base for a few innings. I did my best "waving Wendell" impression, but didn't get anyone thrown out at the plate. One inning we scored 6 to get back in the game, but ended up losing. While we were in the field, I took one of the bats and took some dry swings. The shoulder is feeling better and better, so I'm itching to get back on the field. The weather was a little chilly, so we took off after one game. Unfortunately they lost the second game later in the day. It was a one day tournament with several teams who play a level above us and it was in an organization with some rules that hurt us, but it was still a tournament and we don't like to go 0-2.

After doing some grocery shopping and taking a nice walk around the neighborhood, we broke out the grill and had a relatively healthy dinner of baby spinach salad, butternut squash and a hamburger on whole wheat bread. Good stuff. I hope you had a great weekend too!!!

Victory?

Earlier this week I had my PT session for an hour and then headed to the gym to further my workout, specifically to run on the treadmill. The week before I had put in 30 minutes on the elliptical machine, but it's just not the same as running and bearing your own weight. Since it's been a while since I've been running, I reduced the speed but kept the time at my normal 20 minutes. My performance on the treadmill was.....less than exciting. In fact, it was downright depressing. Even at the reduced speed I had to revert to walking every 5 minutes or so. Ugh.

That was Wednesday, so today I headed back to the gym to see if Wednesday was an aberration or the new norm. Again I used the reduced the speed and targeted 20 minutes again. This time however, I ripped it off without much of a hitch and now walking. Turns out my PT sessions really are exhausting! Maybe I'll try to space out my gym visits and my PT sessions, but that would mean working out 4-5 days a week......yikes, I might be too old for that!

Sure Sign of Spring

There's one sure sign of spring in Chicago; street cleaning. Today the big sweepers came by one side of my street and will do the other side tomorrow. It's nice to have the dirt of winter swept away....or at least pushed around a bit and mostly picked up.

Update on Basra! While I was in Switzerland, the landlord next door, or the city, put out a big industrial sized rat bait trap. I'm not sure if they go in there and die, or eat the poison and die somewhere else or what, but the rat population is down to single digits. For a while, there was only one rat hole left! And one of them caught their foot in T-Rex, but flailed around all night until the string holding the trap down gave way and then T-Rex itself busted! Yowza, that was one pissed off rat.

So even though I killed about 30 rats over there, this city trap put the finishing touches on the extermination. The parallels to Iraq are compelling. They might not all be gone, but there is a significantly lower threat that they will come over to my yard now! Victory!!

On the road again.....

Regarding the FBI story yesterday, there was something else I wanted to say. Why the lawyer would say nothing good can happen is pretty simple if you think about it. If you've done nothing wrong, here are the options: 1) you're going to get falsely accused ( totally sucks) 2) one of your friends is in trouble and they want info from you(sucks) 3) since it was at work, one of his employees could be in trouble and they want info from you (sucks) 4) one of your clients is in trouble and they want info from you (sucks) 5) one of your vendors is in trouble and they want info from you (most likely sucks, but could be cool if your vendor is a prick). :-)

Two games left in the regular season for the Blackhawks and they are in a tie for most points in the conference and the #1 seed. They have set a franchise record for most points in a season with 109 (not goals, but points--in hockey it's 2 points for a win and one point for a tie). They have set a record for most wins in franchise history with 50. They have also set a record for most road wins in a season with 22 and this brings me to my issue.

A hockey season is 82 games and you play 41 on the road. The Blackhawks have been around since 1926. So in 84 years, no Hawks team has won more than 22 games on the road which is only slightly better than 50/50!! If you go 21-20, that's not very good in any sport except if you play hockey on the road. To go 22-19 means you've done something worthy of a franchise record!!

That means to me that the rules are slanted too far in favor of the road team, if other teams have these type of stats at least and I'd have to believe that they do given the Hawks were one of the original 6 teams in the league so they've been good and bad as much as anyone.

What are those rules? Well, you're at a disadvantage with line changes. As the road team, you have to put your players on the ice and then the home team gets to match up against you, always putting their players out last. That's a pretty unfair advantage. If there isn't too much stoppage during the game though, it becomes less of an advantage.

The other advantage is with faceoffs. The visitor has to put their stick down on the ice or be ready first. I'm not sure how big of an advantage that is in reality. The home team also gets to decide whether to shoot first or second in a shootout now, but the shootout is a relatively new development anyway.

Why such bad road records? Anyone know?

Busy work days

ESDNM was in town Monday and Tuesday, so there was a lot of work going on and I was too tired to post.

Here's the baseball play of the year entered in by White Sox pitcher Mark Buehrle. Opening day and it's already at least a finalist for play of the year.

Have you seen Miley Cyrus recently? She looks stoop shouldered to me. She was just on an episode of Jimmy Kimmel, which I Tivo, and someone should really straighten out her shoulders before she ends up with a hump!

Here's a situation for you: a friend of mine received a call the other day from.......an FBI agent. Out of the blue! The agent said, "Don't worry, no one is in trouble. We just want to have lunch with you. How's your schedule the next few days?"

What would you do? My friend has a neighbor who is a friend and a lawyer. So he asks the lawyer whether he should go to lunch with this guy. The lawyer said, "Nothing good will come of a meeting with the FBI." It's true! If no one is in trouble, wouldn't everyone be getting asked to lunch by the FBI at some point? I haven't been asked to lunch yet, so it seems suspicious to me.

I'm intrigued to see how it all turns out. I'll let you know.....if I can.

Heading Outback

Saturday, for possibly the first time, I went to Outback Steakhouse with LL and her parents. The reason I'm writing about it is that because it's a big chain, they have to have their nutritional information readily available. And do they ever! On their website you can figure out the cumulative nutritional value of your entire meal. The really interesting thing is that since they are cooking steaks, you have much more say in how they are cooked to begin with. What you can do is tell them to not cook it in butter (cooking the steak in butter is the default) and to not season it and it saves a ton of calories, fat and sodium. I also strongly suggest the sweet potato as one of your sides. Delicious.

In a rare George Castanza move (from Seinfeld), I actually brought my own bottle of salad dressing into the restaurant (courtesy of LL's purse) and we used that on our salads. Now that I think about it, Jerry brought his own maple syrup into Monk's for his pancakes. Too funny. Castanza brought in his own cucumber for his salad. Living the sitcom!!

Happy Easter Everyone!!

It was a busy weekend filled with traveling, family and cheer. It was also filled with church as it's the most important weekend of the year for Catholics and Christians alike. On Saturday night, I drove back from Joliet after having dinner with LL and her parents, so that I could attend mass at St. Alphonsus on Easter morning. Obviously more people go to mass on Easter, so I opted for the early 7:45 mass instead of one of the later masses. That was pretty smart on my part, but boy were there a ton of kids there! I figured they would all still be sleeping.

Easter mass is always uplifting with a strong and loud, very uplifting organ performance opening the service. It's in stark contrast to Good Friday's mass where we leave in silence.

For Easter, like Thanksgiving, my mom wraps a whole bunch of smaller presents (31 this time) ranging from flashlights and candy to socks and sunglasses. Everyone is allotted the same amount of play money and then we bid like fanatics on the gifts, even though we have no idea what's in the presents. After a trading flurry when the bidding was done, I ended up with a star shaped candy dish and cups with lids (like Starbucks cups). One of my gifts was traded to obtain various scented bathing gels (for LL) and my cherry, chocolate covered pretzels were traded for something as well. It's great fun.

The Easter egg hunt was a total disaster this year! I broke my cardinal rule of "always follow Sommer around" and while I was on my own she was getting assistance from everyone and her mother.....literally. As such I was dominated something 10 eggs to 4 and I finished in last of the four of us who competed. Ugh. I blame Sommer's blinking tennis shoes.

Playing Hooky

It's like 80 degrees in Chicago today, so I'm playing hooky from my blog. After going into the office and hanging out with Ricardo, we decided that we need to go out after work and be outside somewhere. First it's off to the gym for me and then I'm chilling outside.

Ahhhh, beautiful weather returns to Chicago

The weather is great today with highs in the 70's. For the first time in 5 to 6 months, I'm able to wear around a short sleeve shirt. It's also making me painfully aware of how white I am. :-)

Yesterday, after physical therapy, I hit the gym to do some more weightlifting in addition to exercises I was doing in my session. For the first time in memory, I completely ran out of gas on the eliptical and lifted weights until I just couldn't do any more. It wasn't a great feeling as I thought I should do more of both, but it also wasn't as bad as I would have thought. Maybe I need to position lunch between my therapy session and the gym.

The Chicago Blackhawks are struggling. Ugh. They've lost 3 in a row and have been brutal since the Olympic break, when we sent more players than any other team to Vancouver. But the problem isn't being tired. It's the defense. We lost one defenseman to a broken clavicle when he got hit by a cheap shot. Another one has missed 8 games with an "upper body injury". That means we've had to bring up two relatively inexperienced players to take their place. When a third defenseman went down with a leg injury, we moved one of our forwards back to help on defense. The defense was the key to our winning for the entire season and now we're hurting in a big way. Sadly I don't see much room for optimism in the situation. Until this veteran defenseman comes back, we are going to struggle. Hopefully it won't be too late.

Second Swiss video up

Here's the second video. I had to upload it to YouTube. It's about 4 minutes and is just over 2 GB, so I guess it was too big to load onto Blogspot.

Swiss Video

Two video selections for today. The first is from the bass of Mount Saleve where we took the cable car ride. The second video is actually of the ride up. Pardon the poor production quality and my attempts at zooming in. The zoom function didn't work as well as I had hoped.

Oh, it looks like only one video could load. I'll try the other one in a separate post. Shoot!

Friday night and more pictures!

A quick update on my shoulder. This month I've started working on strength as my mobility seems to be fine. While progress the first three months seemed to make playing at the end of May a no-brainer, the lack of significant improvement the last few weeks has put it in question. At my doctor's appointment though, I discussed this thought with my doctor and he said that it's fairly typical for recovery from my kind of surgery. In two weeks, due to scheduling issues, I'll probably start doing therapy twice a week instead of just once, to make sure that I'm getting the maximum workout in that I can in preparation for playing. The doc also said that I could start some soft tossing and even start swinging a bat. Unfortunately he said I can't face live pitching yet because if you swing and miss, it could cause a strain. It makes sense, if you're anticipating some resistance from the ball and you don't get it, or if you lunge for a ball, a strain could occur.

This was on an easel on my way to the doctor. I just laughed.

Last night LL and I headed to the near burbs for a minor league hockey game. The Chicago Wolves put on quite a show in the family friendly atmosphere. It was a Friday night during the NCAA tournament, but there were still something like 10,000 fans there. Not bad. A few minutes in, there was an awesome brawl between two heavy hitters, complete with a squaring off period of about 10 seconds while they danced and sized each other up. Good stuff.

Here are some pictures:

The flames going off during the Wolves intro.

More orangy flames.

Even the scoreboard explodes while it's going on!

And apparently the scoreboard shoots fire too!

Here's the view we had. Decent seats for freebies. I picked them up through a charity auction with a dinner gift card which we also used. A nice night.