Pace of Play

I love baseball.  I could watch it all day.  I have watched it all day.  I have requested Opening Day off this year to enjoy the crack of the bat and excitement of the game.  That's how much I love baseball.  It has never bothered me how long games are.  With that said, there are plenty of opportunities to improve the pace of the game for the casual fan.  Not everyone wants to sit around for two and a half to three hours for a game.  And these are some of the same people that will sit through four hours for one football game.  That, if you ran the game clock with no stoppages, would be one hour.  I don't fully understand it either, but what are you gonna do?

I was watching the MLB Network today and they were discussing the introduction of a pitch clock at the minor league levels.  Same idea as the shot clock in basketball, but for the pitcher.  Once they get the ball back in their hand, they have only a certain amount of time for the next pitch.  It would be beneficial to the speed of the game, I believe, but this is not where the major problem of the game slowing down comes.  It comes from the batters.  Pitchers would benefit from a quicker game as they seem to want to work quickly, some pitchers notwithstanding, and get into a groove.  Batters always want to seem to disrupt that groove.  And the easiest way to do so?  Stepping out of the batters box to readjust the batting gloves, tap your spikes, check with the third base coach as to what your next move should be.

Keeping the batters in the batter's box is more important for speed of the game than using a pitcher's clock.  I know, I know, it's a combination of the batter and the pitcher.  But I think that the batters benefit from slowing the game down because it doesn't really allow pitchers to get into that groove that they want.  The pitchers want the ball back as soon as it hits the catcher's mitt and they want to stay focused.  They don't want to stand around and wait for the batter to scratch his balls another time before stepping back in.

With all that said, I like the idea of having a pitch clock in the minors.  It teaches the pitchers to pick up the pace.  The minor leagues is where players develop.  This is where they learn to play at a professional level.  So, if the pitchers have the pitch clock, it has to be up to the umps to keep the batters in the batter's box.  You cannot have one side of the game learning a new way to play with a new rule set without having the other half learning as well.  

Decommissioning the Tree

We still have out Christmas tree up.  Is that a problem?  Are we clinging on to the holiday that was a little over two weeks ago?  What is the acceptable time frame for leaving it up and taking it down?  There are a couple of things to consider.

The main thing to consider is whether or not the tree is real.  My wife and I both grew up with real trees at Christmas time.  The main issue, of course, are the needles.  You can only deal with falling needles and bare looking branches for so long before you can't stand it.  The nice thing about having a fake tree is only dealing with falling needles when the pets chew or swat at them.  I should say that, they do fall off when we take the tree down as well.  Just not as much.  Having a fake tree, we are not in any kind of rush to take it down because we don't have the needle falling off issue.  Plus, this year we put it up kinda late so we want to get our time's worth out of it.

I'm sure there are people that put their trees up the day after thanksgiving that are eager to take it down the day after Christmas.  And of course, because it's been up for over a goddamn month.  I don't ever remember having our tree up before the month of December as a kid and we flat out refuse to do so as adults now.  Same goes with the music.  If you don't put your tree up in November, you won't be sick of it by the end of December.  Normally, we have our tree up in the middle of December and it's back in the box in the middle of January.  So about a month. 

There is always this big build up to Christmas, I don't understand why people wouldn't want to keep their tree up as long as possible.  It's always a great time of year.  Everyone is happy and nice to each other.  Why wouldn't you want to expand that a little bit longer into January?    

Sentimental Present

It's 2015!  We've made it!  I guess.  Wasn't the world suppose to end a couple of years ago?  Anyway, Christmas came and went.  It didn't feel like Christmas because we didn't have any snow on the ground.  So that sucked.  We got snow a couple of days later, so at least now it feels like winter.  So much so that not only do we have some snow, we also have a wind chill advisory this morning!  It's negative ten out right now, and it feels like negative seventeen.

Other than not having any snow, we had a pretty decent holiday season.  However, it came and went too quickly.  Part of it was because the month of December came so quickly after Thanksgiving.  Usually there's a week in between the two, but with Thanksgiving being so late in the month, there was a holy shit moment a week into December.  My in-laws came into town for Christmas.  It's always nice to spend time with family.  We have spent a couple of Christmas days by ourselves, and it was okay, but it didn't feel like it was anything special.  Christmas time should be spent with family, and when you don't have that, it feels weird.  Like there should be something going on, but there isn't.

I got a wonderful present this year from my parents.  Here's a picture of it.

So, it doesn't look like much.  I got a chuckle out of it because I knew what it was.  It's an ornament that I made when I was a kid.  What was more important was what my mom wrote on the bag. 

 'To Mike,

This ornament has been on our tree every year since you were in preschool.  We think it's time to hang on your own tree!'

Love, Mom & Dad'

As the saying goes:  'Right in the feels!'  It kinda caught me off guard and made me even more sentimental than I was because that's what Christmas does to me.  The rest of the day, I was thinking about Christmastime from my childhood and how great it was.  All about how our extended family spent even more time together, about waking up at two or three in the morning and trying to sneak a peak at what Santa brought us without waking my parents up...and then trying go back to sleep afterwards. 

Christmas Post

*Author's note: I wrote this back in 2008 and I have since made it my Christmas Eve or Christmas day post. It is simple and makes it easy for me to say that I at least wrote something for the holidays. Enjoy the day everyone. Be sure to keep the television off as long as possible and love being with family and friends.* 

We are watching A Christmas Story right now, and there is nothing better in this movie than the nostalgic feel of the Christmas morning scene. More than the kids ripping apart the wrapping, it is the expressions on the faces of the mom and dad. Just the joy that they have watching their kids. 

As much as people think it is all about the Red Rider BB gun, the movie is more than that. It's about family, more than anything.

• Idolizing the father
• Having a life long understanding with your mother
• And the fighting with your brother

And the final scene of the mom and dad relaxing with the Christmas tree alight and the snow falling at night.  Magic.

63/120

Holiday Music

I'm sure I've written about this before, but I am in desperate need of writing inspiration.  Not topic inspiration, but just inspiration in general.  Over the past two months I have not had the need or the urge to write.  For whatever reason.  Anyway, let's talk about holiday music and the fact that it just makes me so happy.

Not all holiday music is great.  There are songs that just don't sit well with people.  Ask anyone and I'm sure they can rattle off two or three holiday songs that they don't like.  Off the top of my head, 'Frosty the Snowman', 'Santa Claus is Coming to Town', and 'The Christmas Shoes' are all songs that I would be okay with not hearing again.  I'm sure we can all agree that the Christmas Shoes song is just plain awful.  Right?  RIGHT?  I mean, it's gotta be listed as the worst holiday/Christmas song ever.  With Frosty and Santa Coming to Town, they aren't horrible songs they just aren't my favorites.  And with only a limited amount of time in which I listen to Christmas music, I don't want to spend it on songs I don't want to listen to.

And then there is great holiday music.  I could listen to Bing Crosby's 'White Christmas' album over and over again.  Every time one of his songs starts, the world, in my eyes, is draped in sepia.  It gives it a yesteryear feel.  Part of it might be because growing up we had the record and it will always sound old school to me.  Same thing with the 'Charlie Brown Christmas' soundtrack.  I love it.  Again, it's attached to fond memories from childhood and watching the special.  And isn't that part of what Christmas is about?  Great memories and family and childhood happiness.

I have found random songs that are fun too.  Songs like 'Purple Snowflakes' by Marvin Gaye.  'God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen' by Barenaked Ladies.  And, of course 'Christmas in Hollis' by Run D.M.C.  And everyone has their favorite versions of songs.  I love, love, love 'I'll Be Home for Christmas'.  My favorite Christmas song.  My favorite is Bing Crosby's version, but Frank Sinatra's version is a close second.  'O Holy Night' by Nat King Cole gives me goosebumps every time I listen to it.  'Sleigh Ride' by the Ronettes is a fun cover.  

62/120