Category: Celebration

Buy me some peanuts and crack’er jack!

It is well documented that I am a HUGE fan of baseball. I am also a huge San Francisco Giants baseball fan.

Pick up any sports page in the past few years and you will know that my poor Giants have fallen on hard times. The once mighty team is barely a squeak on the baseball radar.

It’s tough. The big boys are off to a rousing 3-6 start. Starting off the season at the bottom of the standings, cellar dwelling has become the standard. That’s where they finished up last year.

I used to go to a lot of games with a good friend of mine. She had season seats up at SBC Park and it was a lot of fun. We have bombed out on CalTrain into the summer night to watch our team plenty of times. Hell, I even wrote a book about it.

A year ago, my friend gave up her season seats at the big club. Health issues and rising seat costs along with baseball depression at the hands of a struggling team forced her decision.

She invested that year in season seats for the Single A affiliate, San Jose Giants. It’s a little cheaper and a lot closer to home.

She is also a “host family” for a player. This is her third year being “mom” to a young player who makes max about $10k a year and needs a rent free place to stay for the season. It makes her happy. She gets to cluck over a twenty something kid, he gets to eat well and they both get to talk baseball with someone who really understands.

This year my friend approached me about her “grand plan” to buy up a whole row of seats in the section she likes at Muni Stadium. It is only five seats, but she began recruiting friends to pitch in on the seats in exchange for access to games. It makes her most happy to go to games surrounded by friends and family. So she did such good a sell job, I wrote her a check.

Tonight The Good Man and I get to go to the game as “season ticket holders” along with my good friend and bunch of other fun folks.

There is a whole different vibe in Single A ball. The players are young and hungry. They play for meal money and not much more. They *want* it. Humility is high. There are audience games between innings. The beers are only $3. Half price when the designated “beer batter” on the opposing team strikes out.

Tonight is the home opener for the San Jose Giants, last year’s California League Champions.

Oh, did I mention they are 5-2 so far?

Yeah. Things are looking good in the minor league.

Photo by Karen Fayeth

Bite

: slurp, smack, much, bite, slurp, smack, smack :

Happy Easter, ya’ll

Oh, Happy First Day of Spring too!

Pass the cake!

Feliz Cumpleaños para my blog!

Yup, it was a year ago today that I kicked off my little New Mexico blog, unsure if I was going to make it past a few months.

Here I am one year and 233 posts later, going as strong as ever.

I’ve learned a lot on this road.

Blogging is harder than it looks.

Before I’d get pissy when my fave bloggers didn’t post something every day. Now, I’m a lot more understanding. It’s no small feat to have something to say every day.

Also, it’s made me a bit more microscopic in my view of the world (not like I needed any help in that department). Most everything I see in my life is a potential blog topic.

Even The Good Man will comment, “hey, you could blog about that”.

It’s also given me some writing discipline. I can crank out words, and that’s cool.

More confidence too, in my writing.

And best of all, I’ve met some new online friends who’ve been helpful to me with ideas, suggestions, and support.

Plus it has made my feline an internet celeb! :)

If my blog were a person, I’d give this little one year old a cake and let the face mashing good times begin.

Yay!

Tradition

It’s a lovely thing. It’s a way to bind people together (and not in that “I can’t breathe kind of way”), a way to identify each other, a way to mark time.

In my life there are plenty. Cinnamon rolls on Christmas morning. Posole at New Year’s. Ham at Easter.

Noticing a theme here? My traditions do tend to revolve around food.

Fair enough.

When I was living in Albuquerque and working at Sandia Labs, the Friday tradition was happy hour at Gardunos over by Winrock Mall.

Delicious margaritas, happy hour tasties, and Mariachi as a way to end the week. That can’t be bad.

Today I’m enjoying a Bay Area tradition. Observed by most restaurants in the area and also by the cafeteria where I work.

Clam chowder.

: slurp slurp :

Oh yeah, baby. I know it’s Friday when there is a steaming pot of chow-dah at the Cafeteria. As far as I know, it’s homemade on site. This week’s batch isn’t as tasty as last week, but that’s ok. It’s still all kinds of yum on a cold rainy day.

The engineers will line up in droves, often the only time all week they toddle out of their black hole labs to see the light of day. I get in line with my unwashed brothas to savor the aroma.

Lop off a slice of sourdough, and that’s a little bit of heaven right there on a plastic tray.

So, ya’ll entertain yourselves, I’m enjoying a tradition over heah.

Happy Friday to all.

From the Heart

I wrote up a blog post last night about the Congressional investigation of Roger Clemens and yesterday’s hearings. It’s a good post, and will see the light of day tomorrow, I think.

I’m delaying that one mainly because I took stock of today’s date. And realized my baseball vitriol can last another day.

Today is about love, baby.

So my words will be those of love and gratitude for a very special person.

Someone who has been there from day one, and will be there when I take my last breath. Unfailingly.

Over the years, we’ve had a rocky relationship.

Look, let me just be blunt. I’ve abused this person. Treated her bad. Called her names. Ignored her complaints about pain, hunger or hurt feelings. Pushed her too hard, even when I knew she was insecure. I’ve made her mad. Made her cry. Made her eat cabbage soup or Slim Fast instead of real food. Or starved her. Or made her overeat the point of exhaustion. Didn’t believe in her. Told her she wasn’t talented. Told her she was dumb. Unlovable. Unworthy. Useless.

We’ve had good times too. Trips to fascinating places. She always shows the wild-eyed wonder of a child when visiting somewhere new.

She’s got a great sense of humor. She has a heart built for loving and being loved. She is an artist; sensitive, kind, with emotions that run deep. She looks at the world with a different set of eyes than most, and oddly, can manage to find something good about even seemingly unkind people. She has a knack for finding the human in the heart of even the fiercest person (including the CEO of her own company, one time, in a strange interaction in the cafeteria).

She’s also one hell of a businesswoman when she turns it on. She used to love to turn that part of her on, but lately, it doesn’t matter all that much anymore. Negotiating deals doesn’t provide that natural high. All that arguing is just tiresome.

And she’s struggling with that realization.

She is respected for the work she does for her employer, even though she never gives herself any credit for it. She’ll compliment her employees but forget to thank herself.

She’s always been smart, but as the years go by, she’s becoming more intuitive. Smarts only take you so far. Wits get you across the finish line.

Someday, she may even learn to love herself, at least a little bit.

And the love of a good man has helped her see herself with a new set of eyes. Seeing herself through his eyes, she knows she is lovable, and worthy, and talented, and more.

That same good man makes her want to continue to work really hard to be the best person she can possibly be, because he deserves nothing less.

I admire her tenacity. I just wish she wouldn’t worry so much.

And so today, with as much love as I have, I give the candy hearts and paper flowers to the one who will always be there through thick and thin.

My ownself.

It’s time to treat myself nice. So be it, and so it is.

You have no idea how much hard mental work it’s taken me to get to a place where I could even write this, much less share it publicly.

And so with that, I say Happy Valentine’s Day to all.

May you love yourself as much as you love the people in your life.