Tommy's so smart...

This morning Tommy was playing and running around like he often does. And I said to him "Where do you get all this energy?" His response to me showed his intelligence. He said "I get energy from sleeping. And I give it away by playing with toys and running." Granted, he did also say he gets energy from his 3 stuffed kitties, but we'll ignore that part.

FOOTBALL!

Football couldn't have come at a better time. Just as the Red Sox season imploded and the games quickly became meaningless, the Patriots started playing meaningfull games again. I'm not going to talk about the Red Sox for a while.
The Pats won yesterday, but just barely. And I find myself yelling at the talk show guys on ESPN radio and the sports writers and everyone else who analyzes football. They are all talking about the Patriots always trying to under pay guys. And while that may be the case with some guys in the past, I don't think Deion Branch and Adam Vinatieri should be included in that group.
First, Vinatieri didn't want to go back to the New England.
(http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2006/writers/peter_king/04/17/mmqb.0417/index.html)
"Last week, Vinatieri told the Boston Herald he never really was close to going back to the Patriots and he didn't give the Pats a chance to match the deal he got from Indy." Unfortunately, I can't find the original article, but he basically said he got the initial offer from the Pats and told his agent not to negotiate further with them. He decided that he wanted to end his career in a dome (where it is easier to kick). The front office for the Colts didn't want to get involved with Vinatieri just to drive up his price so they only made an offer once they were convinced he was not going to resign with New England. Clearly, Vinatieri did not want to finish his career in New England. I may sound bitter about that, but I'm not. It's business. But I am bitter than everyone thinks New England chose not to match Indy's offer when the truth is that they were never given the chance. Also, the Pats found out that he signed with Indy from the NFL, not Vinatieri or his agent. What, they couldn't give the Pats a heads-up?
Branch had a contract to play this year, he chose not to. He wanted to be paid like a #1 WR. A couple of things strike me as funny about Branch. Eventually it got so bad that the Pats told him he could seek a trade and if they approved, he could go. So he went out and looked for a trade, but the trades were basically for a #2 WR. So Branch wants to be paid like a #1 WR but wants the Pats to accept #2 WR compensation for him in a trade? Does that make sense? The other thing I found funny was that he filed a complaint with the Pats, he argued that they had given Branch a verbal agreement to trade him and then broke that verbal contract. BUT HE BROKE A WRITTEN CONTRACT BY NOT PLAYING FOOTBALL! The only reason I'm sorry to see him go is this:
My hope was the Pats would keep him and he would stay out until week 10 as he planned. Then the Pats would impose the maximum fines on him and not play him for the rest of the year. The result would be fines in excess of his salary for the year and 0 playing experience going into his free agency period. I'd like to have seen his value then.
And now I just read this quote from him: "I had to do what was best for me and my family. I have three kids. I’m the one who has to take care of them. The Patriots aren’t going to take care of them. Nobody is going to take care of them but me." He was set to earn $1 million this year. I think thats more than enough to take care of 3 kids. I understand business is business, get paid as much as you can, blah blah blah. But don't talk to me about need to take care of your kids. I only have 1 kid and I can tell you I'm not making anywhere near 1/3 of his salary. Does any working-class fan actually relate to the "taking care of family" argument? Pro athletes just sound dumb when they say that. I hope the Pats still impose the maximum fines.

Baseball

What does it say when a little league game makes Sports Illustrated? If you're too lazy to read the article, here comes the short version:
10 year olds (Red Sox vs. Yankees) playing the last inning of the Championship game, Red Sox batting down a run with a man on third. The next batter is the best hitter on the Red Sox and the following batter is the worst hitter, a small cancer survivor with a shunt in his brain. The Yankees coach intentionally walks the best hitter and pitches to the worst hitter, who strikes out. Got it?

So the arguement is, was it as simple as baseball strategy or was it a case of a coach picking on the weak kid?
I understand that it is baseball strategy to walk the guy who can beat you to get to the guy you can beat. But this particular game should be all about fun. Every kid bats and games are an hour long.
At the same time, when is it too early to teach kids about the strategy? I don't think this was the appropriate time. I agree with the writer saying the win was more for the coaches than the kids. The coaches wanted to say they won the championship and see their kids beat some other kids. Let the kids play and have fun.

Red Sox

I've been a Sox fan my entire life. When I was younger, I didn't always follow baseball. My father grew up as one of those kids who would grab a glove and a bat and meet the neighborhood kids for some pick-up ball down the street somewhere. Consequently, he thought I should be the same way and tried to make me do it sometimes. Unfortunately for both of us, it had the effect of making me want to do it even less. But now that I'm a little older, I see the value and excitement in what he was trying to teach me. If I knew then, what I know now... blah blah blah. Not the point of my post today.

So, if interleague play this year has taught us anything, it's that if the Sox played in the NL, they'd go to the World Series every year. They'd be unstoppable! They won 12 straight against the NL. And against some pretty good pitchers. The Sox also haven't committed an error in 16 straight games. When was the last time you could say that about the Red Sox? Certainly not the last few years. The Sox I've come to know recently have always tried to beat other teams with pure strength. You'd never hear about the great defensive play or the great baserunning. The headlines would always be about the homeruns. Thats how they won. Not so much now. Big Papi and Manny still crush the ball, but now you also have Coco catching balls that no human being has any right catching. I mean, did you see that?

So now the Sox head to Florida for the final 3 games against the NL before we go back to the AL. I hope we can beat up on some of the AL teams (Yankees) the way we've beaten up on the NL teams.

I feel weird...

Ever since I got home from work, I've had the strangest sensation. You know how you can put a movie in the DVD player (or VCR) and fast-forward while your watching it? Everyone's done it before, watching the people go through the motions at a faster speed. I kind of feel like my brain is doing that. I feel like I'm thinking too fast for my body. It's very hard to describe, and its not like the world is rushing by and I can't keep up. More like my brain is on fast forward and the rest of the world is on play. But the really weird thing is that my brain appears to be thinking thoughts faster than it can even comprehend. Like I'll be thinking one thing, then part way through that thought I'll have another thought, then part way through that thought I'll think about how I never finished the previous thought, then realize that I did.

So, does everyone understand how I feel? Its very strange. I'd say I'm on drugs, except that I'm pretty sure I didn't take any drugs. But I know one thing about whatever drug I don't think I'm on... I don't like it. Really, I don't do drugs.

Pecker

A guy I work with was discussing a claim with my manager yesterday. Part of the conversation involved a typo in the claim file. They says "When you type with 2 fingers, you make some mistakes". My boss says "ohhh... you're one of those!" to which the guy responds "Yes, I'm a pecker".
In a professional environment, the 12 people who heard the conversation (myself included), didn't know if it was appropriate to laugh or not. So we all kind of looked at eachother for a while before deciding that it was actually ok to laugh. And this is further evidence that people need to think before they speak.

Minor Tommy update and not much else

Sarah has been telling me to update my blog. She noticed the other day that my profile said that I have a 3 year old son. Well, he had a birthday a month ago, so he's now 4. I mentioned the birtday in my 3/11/06 post "Month and a half since last post" but never actually followed up with it. It was a good party. Sorry you missed it.

Since we have DSL this year, and we're Red Sox fans in the middle of Yankee's Hell, we decided to buy MLB.Tv from MLB.com. Its great, we get to watch every Red Sox game on our computer. The picture quality is pretty good. Not great, but good enough to watch every game. We can maximize it on the screen and watch from the couch and its almost as good as watching it on a small tv. We even get to watch on NESN!

I'm watching the game and they just showed the Aflac commercial with Yogi Berra in the barbershop. "And they give you cash, which is almost as good as money!" Funny commercial. Anyways...

I saw this on the news today, check it out. It's amusing.
http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.com/