March Madness
Hello World,
Happy June! There's one thing you know, when Memorial Day crops up, that June is bound to be right behind it somewhere, and most likely sooner rather than later. And so that's exactly where we find ourselves, although I'm sure in many places, the weather has been less than cooperative as far as what might be expected from the June of lore and legend. Around here, we had a week where the weather was all over the map, from the chilly and damp to the hot and humid, so that you didn't know what to wear from day to day, and sometimes even on the same day, not to mention, what to expect next. It finally got so sunny and hot that Bill said the only way to fix that would be for him to put in the window air conditioners, which he did, and now they tell us that we're going to have 3 days of rain, including local flooding, which is certainly not what we had in mind, thank you not very much. Although it does beat the blizzard, which is what I predicted as a result, at least in that you don't have to shovel it, so people in the local area should be glad for that anyway.
Every year, my sister hosts her famous Memorial Day weekend barbecue, which has attracted friends and well-wishers from all corners of creation for 34 straight years, and this no different. My other sister and I made the trek there together this time around, which was a first for us, and had a very pleasant day of it, besides making it there and back without a hitch, which is always a plus. Because all three of us had never been there together on the same day before, I don't mind saying that there had developed a certain element of skepticism over the years that our hostess actually had two sisters, rather than one or another sister, plus some imaginary third sister that didn't actually exist. So I'm happy to report that at long last, we can lay those rumors to rest, and not a moment too soon, I always say.
Meanwhile, anyone who spent Sunday hanging around in the local area to find out what would be the "Concert du Jour" from the nearby band-shell would have been sorely disappointed, and with good reason. After three straight weeks of concerts from the park, including classic rock, oldies and Latin programs, at the appointed time last Sunday, we were greeted with nothing more than the sounds of silence from that part of town, and plenty of it. I admit that my money was on John Philip Sousa and assorted marching band music, in honor of the martial nature of the holiday, but even if they had picked something not quite so appropriate, it never occurred to me that they wouldn't have any concert at all. To be fair, we did not send any scouts down to the band-shell to reconnoiter the situation and report back on the results, so for all we know, they might have planned a rollicking program of mime, featuring a vast array of white-faced people in berets walking against the wind, pulling a rope, or finding their way out of invisible boxes. As with so many other things in this mixed-up world, we'll just never know. But I can tell you one thing for sure, I certainly know The Washington Post March when I don't hear it, and I certainly didn't on Sunday.
It was on Monday that I put out the flags for the holiday, as it was observed on the 29th this time around, and everyone knows that I never miss a chance to fly Old Glory when the opportunity presents itself. The day seemed nice enough early, and people might have enjoyed a backyard barbecue or day at the beach or park, with food, folks and fun, and not much to complain about. But I found that I had to step lively around 7PM when it started to rain all of a sudden, and grab the flags back inside before they got wet and unmanageable. So that was a quick and unceremonious end to flying the colors for the day, which is not to say that it's usually more ceremonious than that, because that would be over-stating the case by rather a lot, but it's generally not quite so peremptory. However, if there's one thing I can't abide, it's wet flags, so when the time came that they had to come in, believe me, they had to come in on the double, no matter what.
Everyone knows how Bill loves a research challenge, so it will come as a surprise to no one that we have him to thank for the information about the new stadium being built in the parking lot next to Shea Stadium for the New York Mets, and you can feel free to visit the web site at http://newyork.mets.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/nym/ballpark/newpark_overview.jsp and see for yourself. Of course, baseball is known as a game of inches, and famous for its stats, so here they are: In comparisons of the new park with Shea (New/Shea) the new park will have more elevators (12/4), toilets (646/568), restaurants (4, seating 3300/2, seating 520) and luxury suites (58/45) and also no roof, which I thought might have been considered. Although it will have a smaller seating capacity (45,000/57,333) the seats will be wider (21"/19") and have more leg room (33"-39"/32") between them. The new park is being built as a baseball-specific stadium, with stands closer to the field and better sight-lines, and will have 3 categories of seating with 40% of them on the field level. Shea was built in 1964 as a shared space for baseball and football, as well as concerts and various other events, and has 4 categories of seating with only 20% on the field level. Then it goes on and on about the new design, which incorporates elements of the old Ebbets Field, Polo Grounds, Shea and all five boroughs of New York City in a 1.26million square foot complex brought to us by the firm of HOK Sports, who are also responsible for 7 of the last 8 new ballparks to open around the league. The biggest surprise for me was that after years of complaining how enormous Shea is, compared with ballparks in other cities, and how the team would hit more homeruns if they just moved the darned fences in by 10 feet all around, in the new park the fences are actually farther out, thank you so very much not! Throughout all of the descriptions, they refer to it as "the new Mets Ballpark" and since they make a point that the Mets ownership is building it at their own expense ($550 million) that might actually be the case, instead of some other screwy name for the place. Of course, this doesn't include the $90million in special funds and tax credits from New York City, or $75million from New York State, which apparently doesn't count because it's too insignificant. Now, I'll have you know that I can remember way back when the dinosaurs and I used to consider $75million to be real money, and not a bit insignificant, but that seems not to be the case any more. Ah, those were the days indeed, and how I do miss them. On the other hand, back then if you wanted to attend your local sporting event, you had as your choice of seating categories Level D for dirt, Level R for rock or Level L for log, and the luxury suites were up in the trees where you had to fight the pterodactyls for them. And don't even get me started on the elevators and toilets!
Happy June! There's one thing you know, when Memorial Day crops up, that June is bound to be right behind it somewhere, and most likely sooner rather than later. And so that's exactly where we find ourselves, although I'm sure in many places, the weather has been less than cooperative as far as what might be expected from the June of lore and legend. Around here, we had a week where the weather was all over the map, from the chilly and damp to the hot and humid, so that you didn't know what to wear from day to day, and sometimes even on the same day, not to mention, what to expect next. It finally got so sunny and hot that Bill said the only way to fix that would be for him to put in the window air conditioners, which he did, and now they tell us that we're going to have 3 days of rain, including local flooding, which is certainly not what we had in mind, thank you not very much. Although it does beat the blizzard, which is what I predicted as a result, at least in that you don't have to shovel it, so people in the local area should be glad for that anyway.
Every year, my sister hosts her famous Memorial Day weekend barbecue, which has attracted friends and well-wishers from all corners of creation for 34 straight years, and this no different. My other sister and I made the trek there together this time around, which was a first for us, and had a very pleasant day of it, besides making it there and back without a hitch, which is always a plus. Because all three of us had never been there together on the same day before, I don't mind saying that there had developed a certain element of skepticism over the years that our hostess actually had two sisters, rather than one or another sister, plus some imaginary third sister that didn't actually exist. So I'm happy to report that at long last, we can lay those rumors to rest, and not a moment too soon, I always say.
Meanwhile, anyone who spent Sunday hanging around in the local area to find out what would be the "Concert du Jour" from the nearby band-shell would have been sorely disappointed, and with good reason. After three straight weeks of concerts from the park, including classic rock, oldies and Latin programs, at the appointed time last Sunday, we were greeted with nothing more than the sounds of silence from that part of town, and plenty of it. I admit that my money was on John Philip Sousa and assorted marching band music, in honor of the martial nature of the holiday, but even if they had picked something not quite so appropriate, it never occurred to me that they wouldn't have any concert at all. To be fair, we did not send any scouts down to the band-shell to reconnoiter the situation and report back on the results, so for all we know, they might have planned a rollicking program of mime, featuring a vast array of white-faced people in berets walking against the wind, pulling a rope, or finding their way out of invisible boxes. As with so many other things in this mixed-up world, we'll just never know. But I can tell you one thing for sure, I certainly know The Washington Post March when I don't hear it, and I certainly didn't on Sunday.
It was on Monday that I put out the flags for the holiday, as it was observed on the 29th this time around, and everyone knows that I never miss a chance to fly Old Glory when the opportunity presents itself. The day seemed nice enough early, and people might have enjoyed a backyard barbecue or day at the beach or park, with food, folks and fun, and not much to complain about. But I found that I had to step lively around 7PM when it started to rain all of a sudden, and grab the flags back inside before they got wet and unmanageable. So that was a quick and unceremonious end to flying the colors for the day, which is not to say that it's usually more ceremonious than that, because that would be over-stating the case by rather a lot, but it's generally not quite so peremptory. However, if there's one thing I can't abide, it's wet flags, so when the time came that they had to come in, believe me, they had to come in on the double, no matter what.
Everyone knows how Bill loves a research challenge, so it will come as a surprise to no one that we have him to thank for the information about the new stadium being built in the parking lot next to Shea Stadium for the New York Mets, and you can feel free to visit the web site at http://newyork.mets.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/nym/ballpark/newpark_overview.jsp and see for yourself. Of course, baseball is known as a game of inches, and famous for its stats, so here they are: In comparisons of the new park with Shea (New/Shea) the new park will have more elevators (12/4), toilets (646/568), restaurants (4, seating 3300/2, seating 520) and luxury suites (58/45) and also no roof, which I thought might have been considered. Although it will have a smaller seating capacity (45,000/57,333) the seats will be wider (21"/19") and have more leg room (33"-39"/32") between them. The new park is being built as a baseball-specific stadium, with stands closer to the field and better sight-lines, and will have 3 categories of seating with 40% of them on the field level. Shea was built in 1964 as a shared space for baseball and football, as well as concerts and various other events, and has 4 categories of seating with only 20% on the field level. Then it goes on and on about the new design, which incorporates elements of the old Ebbets Field, Polo Grounds, Shea and all five boroughs of New York City in a 1.26million square foot complex brought to us by the firm of HOK Sports, who are also responsible for 7 of the last 8 new ballparks to open around the league. The biggest surprise for me was that after years of complaining how enormous Shea is, compared with ballparks in other cities, and how the team would hit more homeruns if they just moved the darned fences in by 10 feet all around, in the new park the fences are actually farther out, thank you so very much not! Throughout all of the descriptions, they refer to it as "the new Mets Ballpark" and since they make a point that the Mets ownership is building it at their own expense ($550 million) that might actually be the case, instead of some other screwy name for the place. Of course, this doesn't include the $90million in special funds and tax credits from New York City, or $75million from New York State, which apparently doesn't count because it's too insignificant. Now, I'll have you know that I can remember way back when the dinosaurs and I used to consider $75million to be real money, and not a bit insignificant, but that seems not to be the case any more. Ah, those were the days indeed, and how I do miss them. On the other hand, back then if you wanted to attend your local sporting event, you had as your choice of seating categories Level D for dirt, Level R for rock or Level L for log, and the luxury suites were up in the trees where you had to fight the pterodactyls for them. And don't even get me started on the elevators and toilets!
posted by El Tango Fandango @ 10:08 PM
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