Wednesday, August 2:
Well, the computer virus reappeared, but after another marathon session with the Symantec folks, I think it's been wiped out for good now. One can only hope.
Nice to see that Alex Tagliani and Paul Tracy have patched up their differences. They got into a pit row slugging match in San Jose last Sunday after Tracy pulled out in front of his fellow Canadian, causing a crash. These were the guys who got into a verbal war a couple of years ago before the Toronto ChampCar race. Tracy said something along the lines of "I'll start to respect Alex when he does something on the track." Maybe people will start to respect Tracy when he starts to show some smarts out there. For a veteran racer with all the talent in the world, he sure is a train wreck on a racetrack. Not the sport to be in, if you continue to leave your brain parked in the garage.
It was a year ago today that an Air France jet went skidding off the runway during a thunderstorm out at Toronto Pearson (spurring all of us in the newsroom into action). It wasn't until that night when I saw the images of the burning fuselage for the umpteenth time that I started to shake my head in wonder that no one died in that inferno. No matter the cause, the job the flight attendants did must have been remarkable (so say nothing of the passengers themselves, who must have been almost paralyzed with fear).
OK, it takes a lot for this Essex County lad to complain about the heat and humidity, but it even got to me yesterday.
Friday, August 4:
Not my week. The computer virus was fixed, but now I have a problem with my monitor. It occasionally decides upon reboot, that it wants to turn itself off and I'm left with a blank screen. After numerous tweaks, it finally decides to behave, as it is doing right now. Frustrating, though.
I love oldies music, and I've given the local stations here a thorough listen. But I'm giving up on them for satellite radio. One too many DJ's walking on the end of a good song. One too many commercial breaks with the same boring ads. One too many times hearing overused songs like, "Brown-Eyed Girl." You get the idea. It's kind of biting the hand that feeds me, but for the amount of time I spend in my car, I don't need those aggravations.
Saturday, August 5:
RIP, Toronto Blue Jays, 2006. Still a fun team to watch, even though there won't be any playoff magic this season. Would have been nice to see them stay in the race until Labour Day, but a six-game (and counting) losing streak is fatal in the American League East -- especially when the wild-card team may well come from the Central Division.
Monday, August 7:
If you saw smoke escaping Michael Schumacher's car yesterday at the Hungarian Grand Prix, it probably came from burst blood vessels that sent white-hot steam coming out of his ears. He's not my favourite driver, but the display he put on while riding on very ill-equipped intermediate tires was breathtaking. In the end, with tires that resembled my head, and tread worn almost down to the cords, he had nothing left. A minor collision in the dying laps led to a suspension that gave way and he was out of the race and out of the points. A tire change to match the changing conditions (from wet to dry) was in order and it's beyond me why it wasn't done. So Schu ended up using all of his considerable talent and ended up with nothing to show for it.
Nice to see my man Jimmie Johnson win the NASCAR race at the Brickyard. It was always fun in past Memorial Day weekends to watch the Indy 500 live and then cheer Johnson on to victory hours later in Charlotte over some ribs and beer at an Indianapolis sports bar. I'm hoping this is the year he finally sheds the second-place curse and wins the championship.
I'm having a hard time defending my stance that Danica Patrick is the real deal in a race car. I admired her smarts last season for keeping her car on the track and piling up points on tracks she had never seen before. But I'm getting this sense that she's gaining a reputation of being a Friday-Saturday racer -- great during qualifying, but unwilling to mix it with the leaders when the air starts getting dirty on Sundays. We'll know next year when she's with Michael Andretti's team. If she's still podium-free by this time next year, then the answers might not be pretty and the excuses won't wash.
Tuesday, August 8:
A colleague of mine, who has forgotten more about Formula One racing than I'll ever know, suggests that if Michael Schumacher is upset with someone over his DNF Sunday in Budapest, that someone should be his own self. He reasons that Schu has such power within his team, that he would have had the ultimate say as to whether to come in for a pit stop to change tires, or stay out there with the rapidly fading intermediate treads. If that's the case, then Schu has no one to blame but himself for failing to get into the points.
76-36 -- the best record in baseball. A 10-game lead. Four in a row. Six out of seven. With 50 games to go, the Detroit Tigers would have to go 4-46 to rack up a 13th straight losing streak. I was pretty confident the Bengals would improve this season, but this is unbelievable.
Saturday, August 12:
Three days off with absolutely glorious summer weather. And so I crammed as much nothing into those days as I could -- lounging around the deck, listening to satellite radio. Too lazy to even update this web site for a few days. Ahhh, summer.
Recently, I heard an oldie that I hadn't heard, likely since it was on the charts in 1969: "Cruel War", done brilliantly by Sugar and Spice, a Winnipeg vocal group at the time. It might be the most bittersweet song I've ever heard -- the story of true love torn asunder by war. It's the tale of a soldier leaving his true love to fight in a war. She repeatedly begs him to let her come and march beside him ("I'll tie back my hair, men's clothing I'll put on") until he finally relents. Mercifully, they just hum the fifth and final verse, the saddest in the song, which dates back (at least) to the U.S. Civil War. But just hearing it again makes me think of what's going on in the world today. It seems every day our newscasts start with war and the fight on terror or related stories. It's depressing, yet knowing that we came within days of another terror attack on a 9-11-scale makes it a war of necessity. It's one that, seemingly, we cannot win, yet it's one that we can't afford to lose, as it's not being fought with armies or soldiers but with everyday citizens as pawns.
And our soldiers are fighting for the freedom and a way of life that lets this old fella enjoy those three days off with absolutely glorious summer weather, cramming as much nothing into those days as I could.
Monday, August 14:
Ever since I waxed on about the Detroit Tigers and their 10-game lead, they've hit the skids. Five losses in a row and the lead on Chicago is down to five-and-a-half games. And now the Tigers are off to Boston. I not-so-fondly remember a late August weekend in 1968 when the Tigers were swept in New York, and their once-lofty lead on Baltimore was down to five games. Legend has it that after dropping the Sunday doubleheader at Yankee Stadium, Tiger catcher Bill Freehan wrote on the blackboard in the clubhouse: "Anyone who thinks the season just ended, sign your name below." Of course, no one did and the Tigers recovered and eventually went all the way. Mind you, that was a veteran team that had finished second by a nose the year before. These guys have come out of nowhere, and against the White Sox they made numerous errors and gripped bats hard enough to produce sawdust. Only time will tell.
Wednesday, August 16:
Paul Tracy was right. There's no way ChampCar was going to suspend him for the next race over his tangle Sunday with Sebastien Bourdais in Denver -- not with that next race in Canada, August 27 in Montreal. Of course, suspending him would have been the gutsy -- and correct -- thing to do. Since ChampCar seems reluctant to deliver a message to Tracy, allow me to insert my own: Get off the track before you kill someone. Never in my life have I seen a more talented driver waste away what could have been a legendary career because of on-track impatience and stupidity. I've had more than my fill of the Thrill from West Hill.
Sunday, August 20:
Interesting item last week showing that visits to Canada by Americans are at their lowest level in decades. Of course, this has the tourism industry in a tizzy and there are opinions galore as to why this is happening: passport confusion, a stronger loonie, etc.. My take is this: if enough people rip your homeland then maybe you'll think twice about visiting theirs. America-bashing in Canada is at an all-time high (at least in my lifetime). No wonder Americans would rather spend their vacation money at home or in other countries. It drives me -- a Canadian -- batty enough to spend my vacation dollars anywhere but in Canada -- and most of it, in the U.S.
Monday, August 21:
So the phone rings at 6:15 p.m., right into bite two of a delicious meal. An unlisted number:
Me (warily): "Hello?"
The phone: "Hi there, it's Sid Horkenshlorken with the Somename Window Company and I'm wondering if you're in the market for new windows?"
Me (politely, but matter-of-factly): "Well Sid, two problems. I'm right in the middle of a delicious sirloin and two, I don't deal with telemarketers."
Sid (right out of Jack Benny): "Well!" Insulted."
Don't be, Sid. You sound like a pleasant enough gent, but maybe you should rethink your business strategy of calling people at 6:15 p.m. And if you were trying to play the sympathy card -- no soap, pal. I'm not buying that any more than I would buy your windows.
Tuesday, August 22:
OK, I wasn't there. I don't know what was said between Ted Lilly and John Gibbons. And it's obvious Lilly was dead wrong in showing up his skipper when Gibbons came to take him out last night in Toronto's latest nightmare, a 12-10 loss to Oakland. I can understand being angry at blowing an 8-0 lead, but you don't blast the manager in public view. However, if anyone needed to show his cool until he was well out of sight and into the clubhouse, it was Gibbons. He's the skipper and the one who needed to show some leadership. First Shea Hillenbrand and now Lilly? I thought the Billy Martin style of managing was a thing of the past. Mind you, Martin was never the one getting his nose bloodied. One thing Hillenbrand obviously got right was that the S.S. Blue Jay is indeed, a sinking ship. If Gibbons can't control his own emotions with his players, then how is he supposed to maintain control in the clubhouse? How many free agents are going to want to get on board this vessel? And how much longer before Vernon Wells comes right out and says he wants out? It's one thing to lose, it's another to become a laughingstock franchise and under J.P. Ricciardi's lead, that's what the Jays are becoming.
Detroit 7, Chicago 1. Oh yeah! Just what the doctor ordered for the sliding Tigers. Gaining at least a split in this big four-gamer with the White Sox is critical for the stretch run. And New York 2, Boston 1 -- the Boston Massacre, 2006. A five-game sweep by the Yankees at Fenway. I remember the original one 20 years ago in a season that featured that memorable one-game playoff between the two rivals, won by New York on a Bucky Dent home run (I'll never forget that, as my father died the next day. No, that had nothing to do with it -- he wasn't much of a baseball fan at all, really).
Voices, part II: Don't know how I forget to mention this favourite voice of the past, but I've always wondered how many guys lost control of their cars when April Stevens starting whispering on songs like "Deep Purple" and "Whispering." Those were two of the biggest hits for April and brother Nino Tempo, and when she whispers "...and the stars begin to twinkle..." in Deep Purple, it sends a chill down my spine.
Sunday, August 27:
Well, it's been a couple of decades. I'd forgotten about the tension that goes with a pennant race -- especially when your team is losing. The Detroit Tigers are in some kind of a funk this month, yet still own first place in the American League Central. But months ago, I said that anything more than a winning record this season would be gravy for me. That's just one win away, but they're taking their sweet time getting it!
Some years, "the big storm" that signals a change in weather patterns doesn't hit until mid-September 'round these parts. Not this year. It came relatively early in August. There are a few yellow tinges to some leaves, the days are cool and the nights chilly. It could still get warm in the final four weeks of summer, but I think the days from stifling heat waves are done for another year. The only thing that keeps autumn from being my favourite season is what follows it. But it does bring about college football! Just one more week before the season starts!
At the risk of jinxing the Red Devils as I seem to have done with the Detroit Tigers this year, I'm thrilled at Manchester United's 3-and-0 start. It's a long season, but it's a great way to kick it off.
Thursday, August 31:
Yep, this pennant race thing is definitely tough on the fingernails. There were the Detroit Tigers, an out away from getting swept in the Bronx, when boom! A three-run homer saved the day and a split against the Yankees. And they still lost ground, as the White Sox staged a late-game rally of their own to beat Tampa Bay. I still don't know whether my youthful Tigers can escape the September pressure and make the post-season. It's been 22 years since they last won a World Series. This season brings back memories of 1967. It had also been 22 years since the Tigers had won it, and they ended up losing the pennant on the final day. It took every last bit of self control I had at 14 years of age not to burst into tears. Of course, the next year they won it all. Maybe history will repeat itself in 2007 if they don't make it this year.
