Momentous Momentum

Jen when to the doctor yesterday and returned with new pictures of the Chickpea. I had to write him a letter about the occasion.

Sunday, we start the hunt for the Nervda family homestead. We're gonna try to hit a bunch of open houses and see what's out there. We met with our buyer's agent this morning. He's a great guy and he's got his own blog. He thinks that we can see 15 places on Sunday. Sounds exhausting to me, but he's the pro.

We're going to have to look at each house and say to ourselves, "How's the Chickpea going to like this place?" It's crazy, but we've got to make decisions for a kid that hasn't even been born yet. I wonder if he'll be picky.

Ramble in the Rain

It was cold and rainy at the James Joyce Ramble this year. Stupidly, I wore a white race shirt, thus making for basically a 10K wet t-shirt contest. Not pretty. You can see for yourself at this link from Jim Rhoades and Cool Running. I'm shocked that that gut and those legs are on the same body, much less on my body. I gotta do more sit-ups. I despite the lack of serious training, wind and rain, I set a new 10K record for myself. I'm pleased with the results, if not the picture.

All joking aside, each runner was assigned the name of a solider who was killed in the Iraq War. I ran in memory of John D. Amos II of Valapriso IN. He was 22 years old and killed by an insurgent's bomb last year. I wish you were still around to make that billion dollars for your mom. I hope all of military personnel come home safe.

26.2 to Copley Sq.

As I do every year, I took the day off from work to watch the Boston Marathon yesterday. Part of it is practicality. I live a few blocks from the course and road closures make it nearly impossible for me to get anywhere. The other part is that it's like have the Super Bowl in your front yard. And it's a sport that I play!

Our friend D. from Slovenia joined us yesterday. She runs too. All three of us will be running in the James Joyce Ramble this Sunday. Nothing gets you motivated to run like watching a world class marathon.

We saw another thrilling women's race. Last year, Catherine Ndereba and Elfenesh Alemu were neck in neck for 25 miles until Ndereba pulled away. This time, Alemu led for the first 20 miles, sometimes by as much as 1:20. Until. Ndereba caught her in the Newton hills around mile 20. They ran together for about 10 minutes. I'm sure Alemu was having visions of deja vu at this point. All of a sudden, Ndereba found another gear and pulled away in shocking fashion. Watching on the big screen at Copley, none of us could believe the gap she opened up.

We stuck around the finish line a little longer until around the 2:30 mark and then went further up the course to cheer on the non-elites like us who live for this race. Lots of people wear their name on the shirts so you'll cheer for them and call out their name. Who am I to deny them?

The most common names were Amy, Liz, Dave and Jeff. (Dave, Jeff, I fully expect you to run a marathon now.) My favorites were the Koreans who ran with backpacks and Korean flags. Everytime I yelled "Go Korea" they'd look over and smile. Jen thinks that they think I'm Korean. Probably so.

Take me out to the ball game

OK, I gotta get it all out of my system.

• As much as I love watching baseball on TV, it's a million times better in person. It was 43 degrees out there, and everyone was so into the game that nobody noticed.
  
• When you think of sports fans and the word "hooligan", you think of soccer. How long before we have baseball hooligans. The guy who got into it with Sheffield last night might qualify.
  
• A fan in the stands along the first base line made a pretty good catch of a foul ball in the early innings and a HUGE cheer went up. I didn't think it was that great of a catch. It turns out that it was caught by Boston College football legend Doug Flutie.
  
• Fenway Franks are ok, but Dodger Dogs are better. Actually, forget about the hot dogs altogether and get a Polish in Wrigley.
  
• The Chickpea was very active at the game. Jen reports that he was kicking quite a bit. We agree this is a sign that he loves baseball, but she's convinced he's a Cubs fan. Chickpea, we have a championship in the last 80 years...
  

Craziness at Fenway

I saw lots of things tonight at Fenway that I'd never seen before. A hitting coach thrown out. The manager thrown out. The closer loading the bases in the ninth and somehow getting out with a shutout inning and an 8-5 win over the Yankees. And craziest of all, a fan taking a swipe at the right fielder. Then the fielder taking a shot back BEFORE throwing it back in.

Jen and I were at the game with JS and his wife JS, sitting 20 rows up and one section over from the scuffle. It was a very tense game and my first thought was "Crap. We're gonna have to forfeit the game because of this idiot." Fortunately, Gary Sheffield didn't go into the stands and do his Ron Artest impression. Security got involved quickly and kept things under control. The picture is taken from our perspective not far from the altercation. How many cops do you count in that picture?

Boston is a real sports town

Tomorrow begins a great run of live sports viewing. We're headed to the bleachers of Fenway Park to see the Red Sox play the Yankees. I've seen these two teams play before, but in New York, as a Red Sox fan. We were doing terribly that season, so the animosity wasn't too bad. The Yanks fans were just indifferent toward us, like the popular girls in high school. This time the Sox are wearing the crown and at home. It should be something to write home about.

Then Monday is the Boston Marathon. It's an actual holiday in Massachusetts. It's Patriots Day to commemorate the beginning of the American Revolution. I haven't worked for Massachusetts based companies, so I have to take the day off. I have no other choice. It's like the Super Bowl of marathons and it's in front of our house. Watching the leaders is unbelievable. You watch them at the finish, and realize that they run faster at any point during the 26 miles that you can run at all. We stay out there and cheer on the regular people who run with their names written across their shirts and shout their names. I know that if I were out there running, they'd be cheering for me.

Is there a secret handshake?

I've only been driving a car in Boston again for about 6 weeks. I don't have an loyalty or disloyalty to a particular gas station. Until yesterday. Mere moments after reading this post by my friend Andy, I had made a decision.

There are two stations within a mile of the office. One is an inconvenient left turn across traffic and self serve, and the other is a simple right turn and full service. So, I decide to try the full service. I'm feeling lazy. I pull up in my very boxy Scion xB and tell the older man working the pumps to fill it up with 87. He starts the pump and comes back to my open window and says, "You know what they call this car? A Puerto Rican Hummer." I'm not sure what reaction he expects me to give him, but I obviously don't provide him with it. It was probably a raised eyebrow.

He starts to back track. "That's what they call it on that radio station, Jammin' 97." Does he think that hearing it on an urban radio station gives him justification? I consider driving off, but there is currently fuel being pumped into the car. I hand him my credit card and fiddle with the radio. He hands me my card "I don't mean to be disparaging or nothin', that's what they call it. On the Jammin' 97. I'm just saying."

At least this guy could tell he'd started in with the wrong guy. But back to Andy's point, what do these guys think when they say stuff like this. I don't LOOK like a guy who enjoys racist comments, do I?

Objectives

I've decided to run my life like a business. Everything's just smoother that way. So then, today is the first day of Nervda's fiscal year. I'm going to lay out some goals for the upcoming year:

1. Reducing operating costs. The outlay for cheeseburgers and pizza is absurd. It's back to the economically effiecent ramen.

2. Win a marathon. I've run one. I'm tired of being a midpacker. Kenyans beware.

3. Teach the Chickpea to pitch. Left handed. This is a major investment. Have you seen how much money a lefty reliever can make?

4. Limit stupid April Fool's items on the blog to one.

You Sent Me to Iraq! You Bastards!!

Trench art: You Sent Me to Iraq! You Bastards!!, originally uploaded by gruntzooki.

So, the story is that this is currently beinging displayed by some soldiers in Iraq. April Fool's joke, or reality? I don't know, but if it is a joke, I'll bet that it starts showing up there soon.