More than just a loss

... Kates and I were up at Miller Park last night, thanks to my friend Joe who had a couple extra tickets to the Brewers-Astros game ...

... Though now, I'm kind of wishing we hadn't gone at all ...

We had foul weather all afternoon, and it wasn't until late yesterday afternoon that Joe alerted me to the tickets. And by the time I got home from work at about 5, and Kates arrived home from school and a full day of preparing her classroom, both of us were worn out. The last thing we wanted to do was drive up to Milwaukee in the rain, through rush hour/stadium traffic to go to a ballgame ...

But we decided perhaps a night at the ballpark would be a fun excursion instead of a lazy night at home. So off we went ...

We got to the stadium a little late and found our seats in the upper deck, behind home plate, midway through the bottom half of the first inning. Though the game was hardly memorable, Ben Sheets pitched for the Brewers, Craig Biggio was hit by a pitch to extend his record and the Brewers lost 7-3. ... And Kates and and I settled on a possible name if and when we have a daughter ...

When the game was over, we put on our jackets and joyfully exited the stadium ...

... We were halfway to the car -- which is like crossing an ocean at Miller Park -- when I realized I had forgotten my camera at my seat. My heart sank, I left Kates and ran back to the stadium. By this time, security staff was closing down the stadium and nobody was being allowed back inside. All I could do was hand my ticket stub to a security person who then radioed up to somebody near the area where we were sitting ...

Nope. No camera. ... They gave me a phone number I could call and sent me on my way.

Today, I've left two messages with the customer relations staff and received no answer. If they haven't found it by now, it's gone.

sigh.

My digital camera. My beloved Canon digital camera that Kates gave to me as a Christmas gift four years ago. It had seen better days, and the lens wasn't working very well anymore, but it had served me valiantly, been on dozens of trips and excursions, taken hundreds of brilliant photos. It was a sturdy camera ...

I beat myself about it all the way home and I'm sure I'll continue to whine about it for days. How could I be so careless!?! ... At the ballpark, I had it strapped over my shoulder and set it on the seat next to me with my jacket. At one point I even looked at it and told myself, DO NOT forget that camera when you leave. I really should put it back over my shoulder so I don't forget it. There was another time when Kates and I were returning home on a flight and I left it on the plane. Luckily the flight staff found it and, after they matched it with my ticket ID, I was called to the terminal desk to retrieve it before I'd even noticed it was missing. Nope, it'll be OK. I won't leave without it this time.

But I did leave without it. And now it's gone.

Hangin' on ...

…Yes, I stayed up until 1:45 a.m. Wednesday morning, watching all 14 innings of Game 3 … but what a sad, sad ending. The Astros had PLENTY of chances and should have won that game. No 1 mistake was Phil Garner leaving Roy Oswalt in for the entire fifth inning. C’mon Phil, even my wife was screaming at the TV for you to take Roy Boy out … I mean, I know he’s arguably the greatest pitcher in the league right now, but even a monkey could’ve seen he didn’t have his best stuff. Phil, when Joe Crede hit a homerun to lead off the fifth inning and it became obvious the White Sox were building a big inning, you get the bullpen going and yank Oswalt in hopes of preserving the lead -- not let him give up a four-run lead and THEN call out to the bullpen.

Need more brush for the fire? Here’s what Tom Verducci wrote in the SI Extra newsletter this morning:

At 2:20 AM EST it finally ended, thanks to the unlikeliest of heroes: Geoff Blum. His solo home run in the top of the 14th inning proved to be the difference in the White Sox' 7-5 win over the Astros in Game 3. It was the longest Series game by time (5:41), and gives the White Sox a commanding 3-0 lead. SI's Tom Verducci was at Minute Maid Park and offers these impressions: The Astros played their first home World Series game in their existence, grinded through the most time-consuming game in Series history, exhausted their bullpen, tied the game in the eighth inning when they trailed by a run with nobody on base and were down to their final four outs, used everybody on the bench except their backup catcher, and had their starting pitcher for tonight's game throwing hard in the bullpen at a quarter after one in the morning. And what does their manager, Phil Garner, do in the first moments after the White Sox punched them in the gut by beating them in the 14th inning of Game 3, 7-5? He rips his team. Beautiful. Mind you, the guy says nothing to his team after the game. But he does march into the official interview room and drop these bombs for the media: “Absolute rotten hitting.” “We might have played 40 innings and it didn't look like we were going to get a runner across the bag.” “It’s embarrassing to play like this in front of our hometown.” “I’m really ticked off!” Way to bail on your team, Mr. Manager."

More stuff ...
a Chisox up 3-0 in Series, but need 14 innings to edge Astros
a Guillen 'feels' his way to 14-inning victory
a Blum delivers against former team

* * *

So my guilty pleasure of the week is ‘I Love the ‘80s: 3D ’ … Mo Rocca (wearing his K-State shirt for bonus points), Michael Ian Black, Rachel Harris and the rest of the cast, if you will, are insightful and hilarious. And the nostalgia that triggers their musings never ends -- TV-sized laptops, wood-grained VCRs … it all makes me smile and I LOVE it.

* * *

For all you ‘American Dreams’ lovers (don’t get me started on this and other shows NBC carelessly wasted … ahem, ‘Ed’ …), I caught this news on TV Guide Online’s ‘Ask Ausiello’ today. Apparently, somewhere there’s an alt-ending for ’American Dreams’ because, well, NBC‘s stupid and dropped the show, despite pleas from critics and fans, faster then Patty could spill a secret. So the last image any of us have is of Meg riding off to California on the back of Chris’s moped …

Anyway here’s the low down from TV guide’s Michael Ausiello. It sounds pretty cool, if you don’t mind a little spoiler or two …

“ … Chris is definitely out of Meg's life. And I know this because - brace yourselves, Dreamers, - I've seen the elusive epilogue! Jonathan Prince sent a DVD copy to me via armored vehicle late last week and all I can say is it more than lived up to the hype. Now, before I present you with the highlights, let me assure you that, come hell or high water, you will see the ending, too. Worse case scenario: You’ll have to wait for the Season 2 and 3 boxed DVD set, which will hopefully street sometime in ‘06. “We’re in negotiations now,” Prince says of the DVD. “And the epilogue would absolutely be included.” But there’s a slight chance you won’t have to wait until then. … In the meantime, here are some interesting facts/tidbits/spoilers about the climax to whet your appetite. Stop reading now if you prefer to wait for the real deal.
* The flashback-heavy capper is 10 minutes long, edited down from 20 minutes of raw footage.
* The only Dreams principals appearing in new scenes are Brittany Snow, Gail O'Grady and Tom Verica. * Most of the epilogue takes place on a bus, with Meg - now a junior at Berkeley - heading to New York to visit Sam at Columbia. “This would have been the first time she’s seen Sam in three years,” says Prince.
* Meg meets a friend on the bus, and it’s during their conversation that we learn that Patty went to Radcliffe and Roxanne married Luke and had a son named Woody Allen.
* At the last minute, Meg decides to get off the bus in Philadelphia, where she returns home and reunites with her mom and dad for the first time in three years.
Next week, Jonathan reveals what would have happened had Dreams gone a fourth season. (Hint: It's splitsville for Helen and Jack!)”

Sunday night tubin'

Don’t mind me. Just babbling about Sunday night TV …

‘West Wing’ … let the demise (and changeover) of the Bartlett administration begin. I never saw it coming that Toby was the leaker. And, geez, I figured the President would’ve had A COUPLE good words to say about Toby’s service. Guess not… Here's more.

‘Desperate Housewives’ … I tend to agree with most fans dissatisfaction about the beginning to the sophomore season thus far. But that aside, Felicity Huffman has been more fun to watch than ever. Call it her Emmy win opening my eyes or the writers just giving her scenes to shine. Either way she’s been pretty darn good … Oh yeah, and we know now who's in the basement.

‘Grey’s Anatomy’ … Yep. Still the best show on TV right now … and Go George!

Astros-White Sox, Game 2 … Just when you think a White Sox opponent might finally overtake the boys in black, Chicago catches another break and wins it. Ah, but if there’s any player on the Sox I’ll cheer for, it’s Scotty Po. Give him some credit: He got a good pitch from Brad Lidge and slapped it over the wall. You go, Scotty Po. …

Going, going, gone

Wanna know what it’s like to do a whirlwind trip of Chicago museums in a span of a few hours? I’ll tell ya …

The assignment was for me and a photographer to attend today’s media preview of the new ‘Pompeii: Stories From an Eruption’ exhibit at the Field Museum for our entertainment section and then, while we’re down there -- and to save as much company time and money -- hit as many of the other hot exhibits as we could.

So I awoke this morning to the sound of my ‘Fuer Elise’ alarm clock at 5 a.m. and left the house an hour later, exiting our house under the early morning pallet of stars and full moon beginning to set over our garage. I met my photographer in the news office parking lot, we drove to the train station, boarded the train and then rode it to Chicago, tracing a perfectly still Lake Michigan as an orange sun rose over it …

Pompeii -- it’s a remarkable exhibit, full of valuable artifacts, jewelry and furniture buried when Mt. Vesuvius erupted in 79 A.D., but unearthed only within the last century. The artifacts, illustrations and restored frescoes provide a glimpse into how established and wealthy the people of Popeii were. But what puts this exhibit over the top are the dramatic casts -- made by shooting plaster into the holes left behind when the volcanic ash and rock hardened and the corpses decomposed -- showing entire families crouched together in an attempt to shelter themselves from the storm of ash, or frozen in time as they tried to flee the devastation. Most of them, the exhibit told, died when ash filled their airways and prevented them from breathing …the exhibit is $19 and runs through March 26, 2006.

We left the Field onto a sunny pavilion that overlooks Lake Michigan and provides striking views of the colorful Chicago skyline and Millennium Park. The sight left us breathless for several seconds as we gazed at the view and then laughed in unison and remarked on the beauty of it all …

Moving on. To the Shedd and the ‘Crabs!’ exhibit -- which I took interest in mostly because of our hermit crab pets at home. At the Shedd, however, we’re talking more than 30 different species of crabs ranging from the size of your fingertip to the giant Japanese crabs that weigh about 40 pounds, look the size of tire and move with their 3-foot long legs. Amazing creatures …

A short cab ride later, we were at the Museum of Science & Industry to review the rebuilt and restored U-505 Submarine. Beginning in 2004, after years of being exposed outdoors to the harsh Chicago weather, the museum dug an underground a new, climate-controlled exhibit hall, lowered the giant sub into it and covered it with a roof. … The result is an astonishing new exhibit that transports patrons through a long, winding hallway of artifacts, archived newspapers, photos, films and finally, a balcony that provides a breathtaking view of the 33-foot high, 250-foot long, 750-ton ship… And for $5 more you can walk through the ship, ducking and dodging through every nook and cranny from the diesel engine room to the cramped sleeping quarters. …After the tour, walk the ground floor underneath the ship, take in more displays of artifacts taken from the captured German sub and several short films, including a fascinating account of how a Naval crew towed the sinking ship back to the U.S., conducting the highly classified operation without any protection in U-Boat infested waters …

Before we left the museum we also wanted to check out the Robots exhibit. But I say, unless you’re REALLY into robots, don’t bother. It was a bust … it’s two small rooms of glass-enclosed robot toys made during the ‘50s and ‘60s. The first few are pretty intriguing to look at, but they get pretty old pretty quick.

A train ride back and our assignment was complete …three museums, four exhibits, in four hours and a reminder of the unique experiences and people that make me want to continue practicing journalism. Not bad.

But my day wasn’t done …

70s degrees and sunny. A crisp, colorful, fall day made for the movies. The kind of day that begs you to cruise around in your car, listening to some eclectic music and holding your open palm outside the car window for the air to rush over it. … So that’s exactly what I did.

For the third night in a row I went down to the harbor and sat silently watching the orange moon rise beyond the lake. Trying to capture the scene as closely as I could with my camera, sucking in every bit of the fish-smelling water, crashing waves and cool breeze …

* * *

Just another reason to love baseball …

Game 5 of the NLCS ...

Last night, lying with Kates as the two of us count down the innings and watch the Astros come within two outs of their first-ever World Series, ironically 45 years to the day MLB officials met in Chicago and designated them as a franchise …

The crowd was so loud I wondered out loud how any of the Cardinals players could concentrate …

Then, one of my all-time favorite gamers, David Eckstein pokes a single through the left side …

Jimmy Edmonds walks …

And Albert Pujols absolutely crushes a pitch to left field. ‘Oh my goodness,’ was all I said when the ball hit the bat. You knew it was gone … Make that long gone, as it sailed over the Crawford boxes in left field to the part of the stadium where the retractable roof’s track meets the stadium supports. It was a shot that would have landed in the upper deck of most ballparks.

It was unblievable. And memorable.

The Astros fans were suddenly, and humorously, quiet. St. Louis wins the game 5-4 and lives to see another game, not to mention Busch Stadium, which is set to be demolished as soon as their season ends …

Talking baseball, the Cardinals win was huge. It puts them back in the exact situation they found themselves in last year when they came from being down three games to two, and sent Houston back home before losing to the Red Sox in the World Series. So I wouldn’t be surprised, as much as I found myself rooting for the Astros last night, if the Cardinals do it all over again …

Want more?

a So quiet, you could hear a pennant drop

a With one magical swing, Albert Pujols brought the dead back to life.

a Pujols's Homer Soars To Legendary Heights

* * *

Cleaning up ...

...Back and forth on the train today, I read my newest copy of Paste and was fascinated by the cover story about Cameron Crowe. ... I adore every one of his movies, the way music fuels his imagination and, at this point, can only dream and aspire to the type of artistry he exemplifies ... And I'm totally pumped to see 'Elizabethtown' now.

...I got this link emailed to me from a friend. You could spend hours playing this -- and make sure you have the volume on your computer turned up ...

Making a so-called life in an old, retired stadium

In the continuing hurricane coverage, a good read about the Astrodome ....

Making a so-called life in an old, retired stadium